Tag: school

Dreams of home are back

These days I dream often of home. It’s usually me being back in Trivandrum. My brother is driving my Mazda, which was shipped across continents for (apparently) no good reason.

The other day I cooked rasam. I couldn’t decide on what to cook, which is where I struggle most when it comes to cooking. I got the idea from Uma who was preparing rasam the previous evening when we spoke. I had a nice meal (which means there was fish), and then I had a post-lunch nap.

These days I dream often of home. It’s usually me being back in Trivandrum. My brother is driving my Mazda, which was shipped across continents for (apparently) no good reason. Towards the end of the dream I watch as my 23kg-luggage bag shuffles away across a container belt, while logistics of my return flight hover around my head like calculus in cartoons. It’s as if I’m contemplating shipping back my stuff to Texas, but not myself.
Wonder why.

Over a month ago my physiotherapist had asked if I miss home, and I quickly said no, just the people, things, and some of the places (lol).

Interestingly, after my big fat lunch I dreamt that I was back in school on a late evening. There were crowds by the stage and something loud was playing on speaker. It must’ve been School Day, you could hear commotion and cheering from back there. I was rushing from behind the stage to our classrooms near New Hall, there was a sense of urgency to the whole thing but I have no idea why. I spotted many familiar faces, made up and in costume. I quickly waved at a friend, it seemed I was surprised that she showed up in my dream still in her uniform. Some were friends from undergrad. All of us weirdly affiliated.

I couldn’t with my dazed dreamy head make out the timeline, but I had to.
If I was still in school it meant I might have to practice for a group song I was better off lip-syncing to anyway for everyone’s benefit.
If I had just got out of high school I might have to attend felicitation and line up backstage – but in that case someone should be looking for me.
If I was in undergrad and just visiting, why were my friends in costume and practising? Or was I in the present, working in the US and visiting teachers?

If my physiotherapist ever caught me in a dream these days I’d respond What are you talking about, I don’t have to miss home when I am home.

I remember being a bit sad when I woke up, and realizing it was Teacher’s Day in India.

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#4 Postcard – Convent schools, boarding life

There’s a Catholic school a 5-minute walk away from where I live. They have an adjacent church with a cross atop a spire that’s visible from my window, and church bells ring now and again during the day.

There’s a Catholic school a 5-minute walk away from where I live. They have an adjacent church with a cross atop a spire that’s visible from my window, and church bells ring now and again during the day. When the bells ring, I wonder what the kids in the school are up to – Is it time for a prayer? Are they assembling in a special room for lunch?

Of course these questions pop up because of the many rituals we had in school. We had a Mary behind a glass wall at the entrance landing that kids jostled to touch for morning blessing, and a chapel with clean floor tiles that was always deserted. When Principals changed, we wondered if the new Sister would be stricter or distribute nicer gifts on Children’s day. There were speaker announcements to gather somewhere class-wise to deliver yet another announcement, and a bunch of similar school things.
What I was most curious about, however, was the school’s boarding facility.

From what we’d heard, life there was unappealing – you had to pray at least twice a day, wash your own clothes, go to bed early, other general dull stuff. However, to me, the plus that paled all cons was that you could walk the empty grounds in the evening when nobody was around, the red earth glowing in the brilliant evening sun.

That was a sight you only saw if you happened to be at school for summer classes, or in the evenings after board exams while walking to the main gate entrance. Or if you had to arrive in the early hours for a class trip or an ISC meet – in which case you’d likely be running around to locate a student or to grab hold of your event’s teacher-in-charge. And you would steal glances from afar of the ground stretched out in the twilight, like stealing precious memories. 🙂

In tenth during Youth Festival week , a junior in our dance team was staying at the boarding cos her family was not in town. She was a window into the intriguing world with her tidbits : they had to wake up early in the morning, sit at a common table for meals, show up on time for prayer at the sparkling-clean chapel. One evening before practice, she went to her room to leave her bags and brought back with her the evening snack – it was pudina chutney sandwich, humble, believable. But of course, I thought, you could stroll around the ground any time you want to, alone or with a friend, in non-uniform clothes (slightly crinkled, because you washed them yourself), soaking in the peace.

After our last board exam in twelfth, we were slowly walking from New hall to the front gate. It was our last day in school, in uniform. We were exhausted and hadn’t planned anything special, no clicking pictures either. I think Divya said that out loud, the rest of us nodded and hmmed. As we passed by I realized I never got to stay at the boarding, never got the golden grounds to myself after all.

Chapter 2 : A dance to onlookers, a decade long story for the kid

In twelfth standard, a classmate asked me why I started dancing only in tenth. It was true. In school.
If there’s anything life’s taught me, it’s to never assume.

(I have so many Chapter 2 drafts and they are not even remotely close in their content, but I feel like writing right now, so A Dancing Child it will be.)

In twelfth standard, a classmate asked me why I started dancing only in tenth standard. It was true. In school.

I spent a major part of my childhood believing I was talentless. I wrote in my diary everyday and I danced spontaneously to songs when they played, and if I was in a crowd I danced in my head. And I believed that everybody wrote, and that everybody danced. Or at least that they could if they wanted to, and I was merely one of the many that put it to practice.

(Also talented people were ubiquitous at my school).

Sometime when I was thirteen I started writing satirical pieces and participating in essay competitions. I had a few classmates, friends and teachers tell me I was good and I believed them. Better than the class average, I believed.

Dancing though was a different story altogether.

Back home I had been dancing since I was a kid to anything that was on TV or on my brother’s walkman, and later on the phone – I was resourceful in making do with the little space in our bedrooms. And when Amma was away I’d sneak into her consulting room to dance. From age thirteen or so I have danced regularly at home (I still do.) But I was extremely shy at school – mostly because I didn’t think I was any good.

From ages ten to fifteen, I painfully watched kids dance on stage as youth festivals passed me by. Painful because I secretly did believe I could be up there (albeit shrouded in self-doubt), yet I couldn’t muster enough confidence (nor work out the logistics that would have entailed if it came to that) to try. I saw parents – mostly moms- dressing the girls up, mine were both working and probably couldn’t care less (indeed I looked at those mothers in short-lived awe and harmless envy).
It was all good since I still participated in other stuff even if I was hardly talented in them, and whenever I saw dance practice sessions I’d tell myself I probably wasn’t a good dancer anyway, yet I couldn’t but longingly steal glances.

During our eighth standard Christmas party, our whole class was dancing and I could finally indulge in active comparison – I remember thinking Hey I‘m quite good at this. Maybe I didn’t want to be proven wrong, but maybe I was just shy.
The next year, auditions for Senior Group Dance were held in my classroom. I remember I was miserably seated on the second last bench with my friends watching the auditions, pretending I had no stakes and no inclination. I vividly remember thinking “I’m pretty sure I’m as good as these kids. Or am I?”
Well, no big deal if I don’t dance another year. I’d take part in drama and group song and other stuff that needed minimal individual talent. I still don’t get how I was okay with singing/acting auditions – which I knew I wasn’t any good at – but not dancing, Maybe it’s true I didn’t want to be proven wrong about my dancing skills.

I didn’t dance that year.

Finally tenth standard came. I remember waiting for the September youth festival from when school began in June, bringing myself up to enroll for the dance, then to show up at the audition. At each stage I strongly considered backing out, and half-hoped and half-feared some mix-up would happen and that they’d never get my name or follow up for auditions.
I remember feeling relieved when I could finally learn those audition steps – as I had suspected I was quite good. Good enough, anyway.

It was a huge deal, preceded by years of self-doubt, and of watching friends and juniors and seniors onstage, years of convincing myself that I wasn’t any good but also guarding my own insecurity.

But when she asked Why did you begin dancing only in 10th? and I saw what I suspected to be an almost unkind snigger, I was taken aback. Should I tell her the story? I wasn’t going to, I was fiercely private.

One small step for onlookers, one decade long story for the kid.

I couldn’t comprehend her intentions and I remember pausing and responding with a confused silence which was all I could gather, and which may have been all it deserved at that point, teen-to-teen. But if there’s anything my life has taught me, it is to never assume.

From class 12 – This was Baby by Justin Bieber, choreographed by Laya and me. For those interested, four house teams participated one of them was disqualified, and we came third. 😛

Read college dance stuff here.

the fantastic dream life

Steve Carell, friends, family and my crush – what more could I want in a dream?

Dreams are fantastic affairs these days.

It started in the dining room of our engineering college staff quarters where my family lived until I was 5. My class was all huddled in that room on chairs and other furniture that I really didn’t take note of, attending a lecture. I scanned across but couldn’t identify any faces except for my crush who sat on the edge of a bed (he wore a yellow tee-shirt and trousers). The professor was Steve Carell.

I mean.

Around 10 seconds into the dream it was revealed that I was sick and had to lie in another bed (in the same dining room), it so happened that Steve Carell was also a doctor and administered me a drip. Curiously my catheter had a plaster on it that said 11 Days in extremely conspicuous red. But also it wasn’t just a mere sickness – it was understood that I suffered a highly malignant disease but was getting better, I’m sure the disease had a name that I could grasp the urgency of in the dream but that obviously didn’t translate so well to real life. My doctor was extremely patient and caring, it almost seemed like I was his only patient and his whole life was devoted to praying for my good health.
Well, the more Carell the better. I’m not complaining.

My class simultaneously transpired on the other side of the room, much like you would expect it to while you’re battling a disease some 2 metres away (it wasn’t a big dining room but it was decent). I have no idea what they were studying but who cares when Steve Carell has all his attention to you? I remember wondering if this can go anywhere, then remembered my crush was pretty closeby (a dilemma I can conjure up only in my dreams, it’s only half-real even in the dream).

The doc later came to my bed and said “11 Days..” in his gruff voice, and just sat there looking into the distance and away from the camera with a proud smile and welled up eyes. He had no other dialogues that I can remember now (it’s been some 6 hours), but he looked at me proudly as if I did well with the medication etc. That’s when I realized – there was no future for us. UGH.

The fact that Steve was probably meant as a father figure in the story dawned on me. I crushed any advances (or thoughts thereof) in my head. I mean even in my dream I knew Carell wasn’t making a re-appearance any time soon in my life except on Netflix.

SETTING: Parallel Dream

In the meantime, I have also been walking around, participating in parallel universes. In the living room (of the staff quarters home) is an ongoing tuition class from my school timeline. I see three familiar faces from a different school (I’m friends with their friend, but whatever). They are speaking in hushed tones, and I make out “pregnant”, “we cannot talk”.

I cannot tell if somebody I know might be pregnant, or if they are talking about 13 Reasons Why that I binge-watched recently, but I also cannot remember in my dream-memory if there was a pregnancy on the show (real-life memory: there was). And then, a gang of my friends from college (CET) come out the class, drag me away and tell me Somebody is pregnant and that I need to leave.

And I leave to meet Reshma at Sreekariyam, right opposite the market but a little further away. She checks my temperature, looks at a bunch of papers that look like lab results and tells me I’ll be fine, that I’m doing good, glancing at my 11 Days sticker plaster. I stand there feeling grateful for the hot doctor and doctor bestfriends I have in my life.

My crush is a pretty nervous person. I mean the outgoing but nervous up-close kind. Or maybe he just doesn’t like me. But either way, I’m sitting there in my family chair made with cane and wood (there are 2 of them and are now in the 1st floor hall at our place), just listlessly looking around on what to do with my time until the plot thickens, the catheter still on.

The dude sits there on a diwan next to mine and I can see him from the corner of my eye, as you do with crushes (the diwan didn’t exist during engineering quarters days though, we bought it some 8 years ago only). I am supposed to be frail and in recovery mode, although I really cannot wait to hear about the pregnancy. In my defence I think my brain was 18 in the dream. The class is dispersed but obviously none of the people I’m friends with are here.

And then, as a climactic move, the dude gets up and plonks on to the cane chair next to mine, making no efforts no hide that he’s making a huge effort. I just hope neither of us makes this awkward. Even in dreams second chances are hard.

So 11 Days huh?

It feels good to know this was rehearsed. I mean that was obviously a rehearsed line.

Yes so crazy. -i must not mention how hot my doctor was- but the effort is going to ruin this-

SO how are you doing now?

And like a Mani Ratnam movie that begins a highly anticipated scene and thence leaves the better but probably understood bits to your own imagination (that is probably wonky and not as advanced as Mani Ratnam’s and is probably going to ruin the story), the camera slowly cuts away, hoping that the leads have made it after lending them a good-enough beginning.

Carell left the scene long ago but also this is crush-logic right here : even if Steve Carell were around, if you have a shot with your crush, just take it goddammit.

SETTING: A Flight on the Runway, boarding

It feels like a college tour but my brothers and amma are with me. The inside looks like a tourist bus, we load our bags in the overhead bins, the rest of my class do not have families with them (I wonder why 😐 ). My family soon disappears into the crowd as I scan the seats to see the dude waving at me with an awkward acknowledging smile from the very back of the cabin.

Wow, so that earlier conversation led nowhere. And I can’t even change seats. Great.

And while everyone is settling into the flight-cum-bus, in an extremely uncharacteristic move, my amma goes missing. I rush outside, my brothers and I are separated into two alternate dreams which soon converge as my brothers and amma return from a paragliding trip elsewhere.

We still need to board and there are too many flights parked on the runway one after another as we run past them to the very end. I lead them to the front entrance and as we enter, my mother asks, Is this the right flight?

Obviously we do not have flight tickets or numbers to refer to. There is only one way to find out. I jump outside and run to the back entrance, open the door (because it’s a bus) and peep inside to see a yellow t-shirted figure.
Excu- oh hey! Thanks!

It’s the dude, he turns and an instant reflex of an exhilarated smile pops on his face, the same on mine, and I run all the way to the front (because it’s a plane) and yell, Ammaaa it’s the right flight. Or at least the one we should be on.

Shubham.

Note: I thought a Steve Carell snapshot would be safer.

School :D

(The kid(s) in the pic isn’t me – it’s Noyna, Jeriya or Miriam, I had bobbed hair until at least 5th standard)

“First line – ‘My-name-is-Parvathy Sarat (Roll No. 28),’” I read out from my English Composition note’s ‘Myself’ page laid out open under my desk. “You’ll have to write your name,” I added in a hushed tone.
“Be soft, Sunitha teacher is making her rounds,” Noyna (Roll No. 26) hissed, almost giggling.

Seated between the two of us, the ever-compliant and innocent Parvathy (Roll No. 27) was hunched on our request, almost lying on top of her answer sheet now, scribbling Myself away with formidable acumen. Noyna and I exchanged messages (literally) behind her back.

“How does she know Myself?”

“She studied for the Unit Test like we were supposed to,” we nervously giggled some more. “Ayyo Paru teacher!”

“Okay next line ‘I – am- 6 -years –old.’”
“Edo shhhhhh she’s looking.”

Being equally weak at English or being new to Class I-C at Holy Angels’ ISC, or more probably because we came by the same blue Ananthapuri travels, Noyna and I were best friends.
Hers was the first stop in the morning, mine the second. We took turns to sit by the window. Unless we’d had a fight – then the person in the mood to ‘Edo sorry’ first would sacrifice their seat as a token of reignited bestfriendship.

We ate Noyna’s jamcakes in the evenings that her Ammachi bought her, blush pink and white with a coating of snowy coconut sprinkles. We’d watch sunlight sifting through gaps in clouds and declare ‘God’ was peeking down at us (I was a staunch believer of God when I was with her). For no particular reason, another bestfriend duo like ourselves was our enemy– we decided we were smarter and cooler, and made fun of everything they did (and not very unloudly) between ourselves.

We were innocent and cruel, like kids are.

Life Crisis No. 1 (English Composition No. 2) :

“Copy down My Family from the blackboard.”

Teacher reads it out for us:

I – have – a – small – family. There – are – dash – members – in – my – family. Fill in the dash with number of members in your family – How many of you have a brother or a sister? Goooood, you write 4 okay?? How many of you are an only child? Goooood, you write 3.

I waited for the Goooood for the 5-member family specimen I represented – it never came. Was it still a small family if there were 5 members? Could I write 5? Mine had never struck me as particularly small anyway.

As the other kids proceeded to copy down the lines, I looked from left to right and front and behind to see if there was anyone clueless as me, making a mental note to confront my parents and my brothers. Jeriya had only one sister. So did Roshni, Parvathy, Meera pretty much everyone I knew.
Then I found Amina with two sisters 😀 We skipped to the teacher, she laughed and said Yes as we waited with abated breaths.
Phew.

Class  II : My Family haunted me again. This time I knew I had a small family.

Class III : Gowri’s adventures with the 10m long python on the road.“Really?” “Yes, you can ask my sister, she was there too!” Of course we believed her, that’s what we did – share our own stories and believe each others’. Kids don’t lie, kids are just creative.

She brought to class the whole kitchen machinery (toy set) – gas stove, cylinder, vessel, and the tiny Sachin/Sehwag figure you got with Horlicks. Under our desk, the whole story played out – as Noyna, Jeriya and I filled the steel vessel with water, Gowri delivered the narration – she was the best. (“It’s getting late for Sehwag’s bath. Let’s put water on the stove” – see, like I said it doesn’t sound as good when I say it :P). Laughter riot and a shouting riot from Deepa teacher ensued.

Class IV :

Group Song for School Day. A flock of frilled frocks. You girls look like angels! (I looked like shit). But surely Angels, with ungrimed and polished black Bata buckle shoes and new white socks pulled up right upto where the fat calves wouldn’t let them climb up.

Class V:

Caroline teacher taught us Little Women – in her crisply pressed sarees with stiff pleats. I knew her finger rings and earrings and what sarees she wore them with. On days she didn’t, I wondered if she’d misplaced them the last time and couldn’t find them in the morning rush as her own father called behind her Paalu kudichitt pooo, like mine did in the mornings.

You just had to sit and look into your books, while she read in her great reading voice. It was a story with Christmas presents and bedtime prayers and pudding and drawing pensuls. My life was He-Man on Doordarshan and cricket with neighbours and monsoon mangoes so the new world charm was way too much.

In the afternoon English-II class, we sat in our blue checked pinafores and ties and shirts as the sun threw light onto the open red corridor outside, bent over our tiny texts – some shared, others on their own. And Little Women by Louisa May Alcott would play out. It was about 4 girls whose father was away at some war and her mother kept reminding them over dinner and over prayer how they had to be good girls and how they were looking forward to playing out The Pilgrims’ Progress when their father returned. I thought of myself as Amy because of my stupid nose, though I knew I’d be Jo when I grew up – everyone adored Jo. Though I knew Jo was actually Caroline teacher, especially when Jo cut her beautiful long hair towards the end to save money for her family (I’m sorry for the spoiler) – Caroline teacher was brimming with pride, giving away her little secret. But Jo was the best, so I wasn’t going to out her.

At the year end, Roshni, Akhila and I were class toppers, and we were asked to pick ‘any book’ we liked from the school library. We returned to class, they had Class VI texts with them (headstart or whatever makes sense to 10 year olds). My logic was parents would buy us those anyway, so I picked what looked like a puzzle/games book for kids. As our class teacher skimmed through it and closed it with a grin, I noticed it said Class Zero.

Yes, I think that confirms I had a disturbing childhood.

Sorry for the abrupt ending though, this should’ve been posted long ago. And a Happy New Year!

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