ADMISSION PHOBIA !!

From the first floor window of my classroom, I watch the frantic parents down in the reception area of our school. It is admission time in the nursery section. Today not only the child must do well in his entrance test but also the parents must impress the interviewing committee. Yes this day is a test for both. !!

So the fathers are all suited-booted trying to put up a relaxed front, but their pacing up and down and the occasional fixing of their ties is giving away their anxious state of mind. The mothers, in their smartest attire , are smiling a little too much, but the worry factor is constantly plaguing them…’will babloo be able to recite A for Apple; B for Ball without a hitch..? Oh! I must revise the nursery rhymes once more….or maybe I should do the numbers 1 to 10 …? The child is unconcerned , playing on the monkey-bars or on the swings as though he is out on a picnic. “Don’t dirty your clothes betaa…” trills out one mother, while another tries her best to hide her impatience as she repeats the tenth time “Good Morning bolo beta. " Today the parents are honey sweet , they dare not annoy the ‘apple of their eye’ and invite a tantrum. That would be disastrous!!

My mind travels fifty two years back in time …I could hear my mother’s complaining voice…”Tuku is 6yrs already ! she should be in school now!” But Baba being in the private sector was forever busy with work and tours. “Next month we will surely look for a school “would be his pacifying reply. But "next month " would come and go ,and I would still be a free bird ,happy in my own world , till one day, ma plucked up all her courage ,took my hand and stepped out of her middle class traditional Bengali home to walk to the nearest school available …Anand Niketan .

It was a small primary school adjacent to the Bangla Sahib Gurdwara , a ten minute walk from my house. The school boasted a strength of probably hundred students . Ma could barely speak English , but undeterred she managed to persuade the Head mistress in her atrocious ‘bong-Hindi ‘ that I should be admitted into class 1 as I was already more than 6yrs old. Thus began my academic life. How simple admission was those days!!

I spent two blissful years in that school. We had classes in the tents and occasionally under the mulberry tree. No study pressure …no security risk! During recess some of us would quietly sneak through the gap in the mehendi hedge and go to the gurdwara for the ‘langar’…the taste of ‘halwa-puri ‘ still lingers…

A voice behind me jolts me back from my reverie. “Ma’am could you please explain this again… “and I turn around to attend to my students.

Ek TARA BOLEY TUN TUN...

Amongst the early recollections of my childhood ,one surfaces very prominently …that of the ‘bajeywala’ . I was perhaps 5yrs old. Those days we used to live in one of the government houses on Baba Kharak Singh Marg erstwhile Irwin Road, one of the radials of Connaught Circus. Today ,those houses do not exist . The State Emporia have come up in their place.


Men on foot or on bicycles, selling vegetables , sweets ,toys, even utensils were a common sight then. Mothers could buy things at their very doorstep .How simple and convenient life was !


The bajeywala would come by once a week. I still remember his tall gaunt frame, a colourful ‘bandhni’ turban wrapped around his head, clad in a white dhoti and kurta , coming down our back lane fiddling on a single- stringed musical instrument. ..nothing as sophisticated as the toy synthesizers that kids play with today. It was crudely made with a earthenware pot at one end sporting a foot long bamboo with a wire tightly drawn along its length and wrapped around a small knob…what one would call ‘ek tara’. He would play melodious tunes on it ,the most popular one being a hit song of those days …”Mera man doley mera tan doley..”This was his way of announcing his presence in the neighbourhood . No sooner did the kids hear him they would rush out and flock around him . Being a little shy ,I would watch from a distance while he would regale us with popular movie tunes , in the hope of selling his ‘ek taraas’.


Once, after much persuasion , my mother bought me one . I settled down happily to play it. It was after all very simple . All one I had to do was run the fiddle over the wire…and the music should pour out. But no matter how hard I tried I could not get a single melodious note out of it! Certain that mine was a bad piece ,I insisted on having the one that he was playing. The bajeywala indulgently replaced mine with his and walked away fiddling another popular song on it...’raja ki ayegi baraat ,rangili hogi raat… while I was left making scratchy noises on mine.

I Have Confidence In Me

My family tells me I should write. My husband is forever suggesting topics , my daughter feels I have great potential and creates a Blog spot for me , my son believes I have a flair for comic descriptions …Wow!! At the face of such encouragement I am now convinced I CAN write. “I have confidence and confidence in meee” as Julie Andrews sang in Sound of Music! My hands are poised on the keyboard, my eyes are staring expectantly at the computer screen waiting for my thoughts to weave themselves into words ….my brain is whirring with ideas…one topic is chasing another…should I begin my blog by writing about my mother I miss so much ? or should I talk about my father I looked up to ?...No no, I think I should begin by sharing my experiences as a child, a young girl, a wife, a mother , a friend ,a teacher…..hold on guys , my ‘thought processor’ is churning…I have so much to ‘talk’ about. Will be back soon. Cheerio!!

My First Post

Following the rest of the family into the cybersphere - willingly, enthusiastically, and with lots of thoughts and ideas to express.