Those old school days...

I inherited all my school textbooks from Di.
Di's books were an example of how a book could be used and still looked as if it hadn't been used!

I was and am totally against this mentality! I love to leave behind my mark - ("Yes! I have read this text!") on books and benches ( not on tourist places!) .

Since I was least interested in what went on in class, I would put my heart and soul into decorating my textbooks! My favorites were language books- hindi, English etc. Because they had stories and pictures of human beings whom I could turn into demons by drawing two horns and a long tongue! And 1 subject I hated to study but on whose textbook I spent maximum time was Sanskrit! Sanskrit textbooks were filled with drawings of Kings and Queens, and I not only turned them into demons but also put thought bubbles in front of their mouths and filled it with funny dialogues!

I sat on the very 1st bench, right below the teacher's nose. Another of my classroom time pass was to give to the teacher whatever she required before anybody else could! I really don't understand today, what was the whole excitement about? But there were some others like me who gave me competition , so yes, that activity must have been interesting! In that event of being the first to give, we would fall- sometimes at the teacher's feet and hit each other to be the first and often get back on the bench with taunts from the teacher like - " I wished you had fought that hard for marks!"

So once our Sanskrit teacher asked for the textbook and "Jhataak" I gave it in her hands! And then it occurred to me that other than textbooks, I could give anybody anything! She opened the book and went through the pages, closed it and looked at the cover-

" Is this your textbook Janaki? What is this?"

Err...... Textbook it was, with my creativity all over the pages!

The teacher couldn't stop at that. She could not read that text book - fine, throw it back at me, you don't need to lecture me in front of the class, especially with those silly boys giggling behind!

"How old are you now? This is what is expected out of a 14 year old girl?"

- I never understand such dialogues- what do you mean by "this is not expected out of a so and so year old boy or girl?" Oh come on, what we do is all human...not that I am the first girl in the world to do that!
But when it was my turn to teach- I said the exact same dialogues to confused teenagers!

" Get out of the class and erase all that right now!"

ERASE?? Erase what? I wanted to tell her, the kings are no more kings- they are demons! Either they will live on my text as demons or nothing!

But I was put to the task right away!

My poor little frail textbook!


First, it was 3 years old ( my sister's) ,
secondly I had mishandled it,
Thirdly I drew all my pictures with 4B or 2B pencils, and had carved out my drawings so deeply that the original picture could hardly be seen!

I did not know how to start, from where to start! Finally I decided it would be the horns! The first stroke of the eraser and the page got torn!

Chalo , ho gaya kaam!

Thankfully the school bell rang and I was out of the school building even before the teacher came out of the class.

Unfortunately now, in my text , there are no pictures, no humans , no animals! It's just boring alphabets! All I can do is mark important sections with glitter pens and markers for some fun- but that's it!

For all this and so much more, I miss those old school days.....