Another old post

MEMORIES OF PRIMARY SCHOOL

Posted on December 20, 2008

The other day as I sat listening to a wonderful show on the radio where the
host was talking about his schooldays,memories of my childhood came into my
mind and I started reminiscing about my childhood.
Those were the golden days of my life with so much joy,carefree
life,innocence,togetherness....will they ever come back?
I know the answer is "no",but......I wish......
Like most of the kids,I loved to go to school.The teachers of my school
were truly like mothers.In Lower & Upper Kindergarten(which we fondly
referred to as LKG & UKG),we had classes from 7:45 to 11:15.I remember as
the last period approached,tears would start streaming down my cheeks,the
reason was that as both my parents were working,I had none to look after me
at home,so I had to go to a creche situated just a few houses away from
home,and due to some unknown reason,I never liked going there.I would wail
in the class demanding to go home.My teachers tried to pacify me by even
drawing my sorrowful face on the blackboard,but it was of no avail.My class
teacher in LKG,a certain Maria Miss even complained to my parents on the
"parent-teacher" meeting!She not being well versed with bengali would sound
so funny when she tried repeating my wails.It was like this:I'd cry as "AMI
BARI JABO and she'd get the verb form mixed up and say"AMI BARI JABE"!!! In
UKG,our class teacher,Babli Miss went on leave and we had another
teacher,Soma Miss who lived near my school and she offered to keep me at
her place after school everyday till my mother would return from office.I
sincerely appreciate her act and wonder if more and more children get the
priviledge to have such fabulous human beings as their teachers.coming back
to Babli Miss,I had a "GET WELL SOON" card ready for her,which I'd planned
to send her through one of the teachers,but somehow it didn't materialise
and till a few years back the card remained with a note written in my
childish writing.
Primary school began with different timings,11:30 to 4:15.I remember the
school bus would drop us to school by 11:15 and we'd rush to our classrooms
to leave our bags and then run down to play in the grounds.Our playground
was huge compared to our sizes then!We'd play all kinds of games like "hide
and seek","catching","colourman","racing","help sister","lock and key";we'd
also pretend having mystery to solve in imitation of the "famous five"!Then
as the bell would go,we'd again rush back to class where we had a prayer
session.Everyday a girl would recite the prayer verse from the office room
which would be played in each classroom through the sound boxes,then our
principal Sister Reshma would sing a verse which would be sung by all of
us.I still remember the first few words of the morning prayer:"Our Father
in Heaven,Holy be thy name,Thy kingdom come,Thy will be done.Give us today
thy Holy Bread...."
Music lessons with dear Philip sir was fun.He'd play beautiful songs on the
piano for us.From him we learnt innumerable melodies.Of them my favourite
continues to be "I have a dream" till today.The words were so inspiring.



I have a dream, a song to sing
To help me cope with anything
If you see the wonder of a fairy tale
You can take the future even if you fail
I believe in angels
Something good in everything I see
I believe in angels
When I know the time is right for me
Ill cross the stream - I have a dream

I have a dream, a fantasy
To help me through reality
And my destination makes it worth the while
Pushing through the darkness still another mile
I believe in angels
Something good in everything I see
I believe in angels
When I know the time is right for me
Ill cross the stream - I have a dream
Ill cross the stream - I have a dream

I have a dream, a song to sing
To help me cope with anything
If you see the wonder of a fairy tale
You can take the future even if you fail
I believe in angels
Something good in everything I see
I believe in angels
When I know the time is right for me
Ill cross the stream - I have a dream
Ill cross the stream - I have a dream

I still remember the blackboard where Sir would write down the words of the
song that we were supposed to learn that day.He would even explain them to
us.Another very favourite song was "Do it now".It had inspiring words too.

Ours was a Convent school,so we had much music throughout the year with
prayer songs topping our list.Christmas meant a lot of celebrations with
fun,frolic and more music.Either Philip Sir or Ashit Sir-our dance teacher
would dress as Santa on the day our school closed for winter vacations,it
would be usually on the 23rd or 22nd December.We would be taught the
practice of sharing with others and we had a gift giving session when each
of us would carry gifts in the form of
biscuits,jams,pickles,clothes,blankets,etc to be donated to the poor and
the needy.
The teachers who loved me a loooooooooooot and were equally loved by me
were Nisha Miss,our class teacher in class III and IV,Sushmita Miss,our
Bengali teacher(she loved my handwriting and often praised me!),Philip
sir,Reba Miss,our Games teacher.The Games periods were our favourite,we'd
do a few rounds of routine marching and then we had the liberty to play as
much as we wanted to.
Nisha Miss was such a favourite with us that I remember feeling very sad on
being promoted to class IV because it meant losing her as our class
teacher.I remember walking up to her with my friend Nandini to thank her
for being a lovely teacher,and you can imagine our joy to see her as our
class teacher again in class IV!
In class II,our class teacher was Mrs.Chandana Kar who was a very
sophisticated lady and wanted to make us one too and she taught us to greet
her in the morning as "Good Morning Mrs.Kar" instead of our usual "good
morning miss" and in the evenings we had to say "Thank You Mrs.Kar,Good
evening Mrs.Kar And Bye-Bye Mrs.Kar"!
I have very vague memories of classI,don't know why but probably because
our class teacher,Mrs.Rekha Bhattacharya wasn't that friendly with us and
she'd always be scolding all of us! But I remember sitting beside Somhrita
and Ritwika and we'd play "doctor-doctor" where I'd invariably agree to
play the patient (being the submissive one always) ,Somhrita,the doctor and
Ritwika,the nurse. I remember carrying bread to school everyday for tiffin
and Ritwika carried apples and neither of us liked our tiffin and would
feed the crows from the windows.I remember our bengali teacher,a certain
Bibha Miss who taught us to write essays.She would write the essay on the
board and we had to copy them down in our notebooks.
Our school had a lot of events lined up for us to participate in.I always
took part in the writing and speech competetions and often won accolades
for them.I also did well in the "flower arrangement" competetion having
stood 1st in successive years.In the functions,I'd always take part in
music,dance was something that I just couldn't and was allergic too! So the
Dance lessons were my least favourite ones!
I had so many wonderful friends in school-Roma,who was in the same section
always with me till we left school from UKG(when she
joined),Sootrisa,Madhurima,Sukanya,Mahmootha,Ritwika.....they remain close
friends of mine even today.I remember once in class IV,our principal,
Sr.Reshma,who used to take our Moral science classes,punished me and
sootrisa by sending us out of the classroom for giggling during the
prayer.We were giggling over a very silly thing,i remember it but I won't
divulge that!Let that remain one secret from my schooldays.
We had regular "Parent-teacher meetings" and though every time the teachers
spoke well of me,I always felt nervous attending them!Being a very
goody-goody,studious girl,I was always in my teachers' good books.May be
that's why I loved my school all the more and still feel so nostalgic when
I see some child in the same blue frock or white shirt and blue skirt with
navy blue socks and black ballerina shoes.........