School memories

As usual, on vacations, I have nothing better to do other than sleep, watch movies and waste time. Today I was just lying down on the bed, remembering my school life. I had done my whole schooling from LKG to 12th, at the same school :- St Thomas Residential School in trivandrum. As I was going through my school life, I was seized with a big urge to write a small post in my blog dedicated to my school life memories. There are lots and lots of things which I would like to write about my school life, but then I guess I can't put down the entire things in one post. So here I am putting down in words some of my fondest memories of my school life.

It was when I was in 4th standard. I was one hell of a restless mischievous naughty boy then. The lunch break was the time when most of the actions took place on those days. The lunch break was a horror time for my classmates while it was party time for me. The moment everyone washes their hands and sits down to have their lunch, their horror, in my form, appears. I start from one corner of the class and stops at each lunch box, checks whether the person (I followed a policy of no gender discrimination) had bought chicken or not. If any unfortunate guy/gal did bring chicken for his/her lunch, then they are forced to make their lunch boxes lighter, and my hand heavier, by one chicken piece. Obviously vegetarians were left unscathed. Though most of the class meekly "surrendered" to this torture, there were some other chicken-lovers who put up a brave fight by gobbling up an entire chicken even before I could reach their desk.

In the evenings, when my mom opens the lunch box, she would find a huge pile of chicken bones inside. In order to put a stop to my embarrassing habit, she will make chicken for me for lunch. But then being the smart boy that I was, I ate both my chicken and others' chicken and returned home with even bigger pile of chicken bones. After that my mom knew I was a hopeless case and didn't try anymore "tricks".

In 4th standard, I don't think there was even one teacher who hadn't had atleast one complaint against me. But the one who leads the pack was my social science teacher. I don't exactly remember her full name. Let's call her my SST (social science teacher). In those days, we had a 45 minute lunch break. 10 minutes went for lunch. Remaining time we played football. I guess rugby would be a more appropriate name. I would just roll and roll on the ground, in the name of playing football. Our uniform was made up of a white shirt and gray shorts. Not so for me post lunch break. It becomes brown and brown. Most of the days, the very next period after lunch break is the social science class. The teacher would enter the class. Then she would scan the class. What does she see. 40 white shirts and 1 brown shirt.This is how she tracks down her "favourite" student.

SST : Sree Shankar please get up. Come to the front.
I come to the front with my head looking down all the time

SST : So what happened
me: Nothing
SST : How did the white shirt become brown
me : I was playing football
SST : You were playing football alone?
me : No
SST : Then how come I see only 1 brown shirt.

I would look around the class. Hmm she is right. Do these guys apply any anti-dust lotion before coming to play?

me : I don't know teacher.
SST : Ok do one thing. Take off your shirt and put it on the window grill. You can put it on after the class is over.

I would go to the window grill, took off my shirt and put it on the the grill and returned back to the seat. Now the class looks better. 41 white shirts : 40 half sleeve shirts and 1 sleeveless shirt
(my banyan). If anyone thought this experience would have changed me, then they are horribly mistaken. This routine continued throughout the whole year :D.

When I was studying in the 5th standard, the maths subject was taught by one Mrs Alieyamma George ( I am not exactly sure of the name since most of the teachers in my school had their names as Alieyamma or Achamma or some variations of these 2 names. So I often confuse one teacher with another ). She was an expert in giving pinches. I am sure her resume would contain a degree on advanced course in pinching. She had invented her own method for pinching. It was as follows. She would search the entire triceps part of the hand for the most fleshy part. Once she finds the "weak" spot, it's a nightmare from then on. She swirls the skin at that area. The more she swirls, the more one goes up one his/her toes. Any outsider, on seeing a victim, could easily mistake it to be a ballet dance practice. The ISRO guys could surely have saved a few rockets, which failed to reach the space, if only they had thought of using our teacher's pinch instead of any fuel propellant. Even the rockets won't dare defy her pinch. No prizes for guessing who got the maximum pinches that year. One pinch from her would suffice to answer the question "how many stars are there in the universe".

Towards the end of the year, Alieyamma teacher had asked for a feedback. I don't know whether the above experiences had played any role in my feedback, but this is what I wrote.
" Teacher you are fat. I think you have diabetes"
Actually I don't recollect the above incident. It was told to me by my favourite teacher in school, Mrs Poonam Lal. Had anyone else told me such a thing happened, I would never have believed him or her. I must say I really had some guts when I was small.

These experiences do not even form the tip of an iceberg. Maybe some other time I may write another blog narrating more such experiences.