My School

South Point....one of the best schools of India & the most populated school in Asia....thats my school........I have spent the 15 most important years of my life here......this was the place where I came to as a little child, oblivious of the world around & from where i went out as a 18-year old young soul, with the "courage to know" & explore the unknown world ahead....

I was admitted in nursery 1 at the age of 3....In the interview i was asked, "have u ever read in any other school before this?".....many chaps begin their education in montessories.....but i had not.....my parents had already told the teachers about that....I replied "Yes".....my parents were quite stunned & embarassed.....the teachers gave a long, hard look at them & said "what school?"......I replied with a sweet smile "South Point!!!!"(Can u imagine that???......I had been so innocent & enthusiastic that i thought i was already studying in South Point).....that was it....I was admitted immediately.......

At the beginning, I was rather simple & feeble.....Often I got beaten by the boys of my class.....i did nt hav much friendz....& the school was a place i hardly liked....nobody really seemed to know me....

I felt i needed to change....change so that the other students would come & make friendz with me.....everyone would know me....teachers would know me....they would like me.....& yes.....i worked a little harder....& started getting nice ranks....soon i became quite popular.....the "good boys & girls" of the class came & talked to me.....& i enjoyed that, man!!!!!!!!....i really did enjoy that....

Another thing I would like to reckon at this point is that it was around this time .....more specifically in class 4 that i had for the first time come upon soumya(who has been my best friend right from class 5 till now)

& then it was CLASS 5 which completely changed my notion about South Point.....i fell in love with my school......i loved going to school ....& the two persons responsible for bringing about this change in me were our class-teacher tandra aunty & our maths teacher rajshree aunty(my favourite teacher in life).....rajshree aunty liked me immensely & was extremely biased towards me....i loved the importance i was getting.....& the attention of other students.....I was made one of the Prefects.....that was my first experience of respect, pride, prestige......I was arguably the most meritorious student of class 5 section B....

Here i would like to mention one incident on which i would illustrate later on...on my birthday, 5th october.......i received a wafer biscuit from a friend of mine....when i asked the reason, she said, "today s my birthday.thats why!!"....i was quite astonished....I could only say, "today s my birthday as well!".....& this coincidence led to something far more significant.....far more interesting.......

After class 5, we were to leave our junior school at 16, mandeville gardens & enter a new world, South Point High School at 82/7A, Ballygunje place....the day we attended the junior school for the last time as students.....i could nt hold back my tears.....i had cried the whole night before.....it is very hard to leave the place where one spends his early years ....it was nothing less than a family.....a large family bound together by innocent feelings of tender minds...

thats my junior school, South Point

When we were admitted in SPS, we were just 3 year-old infants who knew nothing....compared to that we were so much matured(!!!!!) when we came to the high school......but there was one thing we all disliked.....in CLASS 5 we were the seniors..... all other students were afraid of us & obeyed us.....but now we were the juniormost batch......& everything was reversed....we were now afraid of the big "dadas" of class 8-9-10.....they tried to bully us whenever they could.....still, i loved going to school.....the atmosphere was so nice n charming....

But I can at least proudly say that unlike many of the "good boys" of our class.....i had many "bad boys"-friends....that's because i did nt want to make friends with meritorious students....i only wanted to befriend those whom i liked & who had a nice heart......& that has nt changed even today....!!

Days passed by.....I was towards the end of class 7.....& that was the time when i started feeling an intense attraction towards one of my classmates....it was a strange feeling.....quite new & refreshing &....whenever i dreamt about her.....it gave me etherial pleasure.....A huge transformation was in the waiting for me....

It was class 8.....I had ranked 3rd in the annual examinations of class 7.....that was my best result in school....the whole school(morning session) knew me by then....In the meantime i suddenly came to know that 2 of my very good friends were in love with this same girl to whom I was attracted....I thought & thought & thought & finally decided to stand out of the whole thing & keep my feelings a secret....It was nt that i had acted in this way due to my greatness or something like that.....but i just did nt have enough confidence in myself to speak out my mind....

On the otherhand, by this time our maths teacher Joydeep Sir had become a fan of mine.....yesss, i dare to use the term "fan"!! He had been teaching us maths from class 6.....but neither had i liked him nor had he liked me....it all changed in 1 day.....He was giving us geometrical riders to solve....& most of them were rather easy....all were asking him to give a little more challenging problems....somehow it hurt his ego....He said, "OK....I ll give u people a rider....if anyone can solve it, I will say that he has indeed been able to learn maths in the true sense.....& if none of u can't, u will have to give me ur word that u will never again bother me for challenging sums".....we had to agree....as he read out the problem, there was pindrop silence in the class.....the moment i saw the sum, i felt i could do it....i went by my instincts.... & did it.....he checked my copy & said, "shabash....u know maths"....the entire class started clapping for me.....I felt so much elated....it was a gr8888 honour indeed.....

Class 9-10 were the best days of my school-life....in fact those were the best days of my student-life.....& it was mainly because i used to spend a lot of time with the girl whom i had loved so much(& it has been my one & only love till now.....but dont develop any misconceptions.....let me make it clear from the very beginning that it was purely one-sided).....I know not whether i will ever be able to love anybody again with that same passion.....

By this time, i was already quite transformed....till then, all teachers had liked me....& i had always been intent on attending classes seriously & drawing their attention & on maintaining a good image.....in short, i was a "good boy"....but now i suddenly wanted to become a "bad boy"....not academically...but the other way round....i wanted to make fun of the teachers who cant teach.....I wanted to be the "hero" of the class....& yes, I did it upto a certain extent....we had a maths sir who was rather dumb(not literally of course)....& he had such a hoarse voice that would frighten a crow....he was extremely tall & so was nicknamed "jumbo"....i practiced imitating his voice for a month(believe me, it was one of the toughest courses i had ever undertaken.....yaaa seriously)....& I nearly attained perfection.....all crows within 40 metres would fly away whenever they heard me imitating "jumbo".....he had a pet sentence while calming us down "katha noy".....one day as he had just entered the class & was about to utter thos words....I shouted at the top of my voice "katha noy"....it had been so similar to jumbo's voice that none had realized anything....except thos just in front of me & .....of course jumbo himself....but he could nt say anything because nobody would believe that it was done by me & not him....he only stared at us with a perplexed look....that day we had some real fun when the secret was disclosed to the whole class.....

Let me relate another of my deeds....It was class 10……our teacher was a perfect example of “unity in diversity”!….bcoz she had a head(which was blocked 2 give a resultant blockhead)& her hair bore all the 7 colors of rainbow……she was almost 6 ft tall….loathesome in appearance…..with a terribly oily skin(it seemed that her husband ownd lots of oilmills)....she was the laughing stock not only of her students but also among her colleagues....one day....God knows why.... we felt that it would be gr888 fun to put a cockroach in her chair.....i took the responsibility of this bold task…I sprayed mortein in my house…..the next day found many cockroaches dead(most of them were actually half-dead)……& brought 2 of the larger ones to school in a jar……but there was a problem……the cockroaches were very slowly coming back to life …….so we could n't just put it on her chair & wait…because then the cockroaches would walk away …so we waited till she entered the class....& as she turnd her back to us(she loved doing sums without explaining)…I got up slowly…& as soon as I reached near her chair…she turned back & saw me…..but she was nothing short of an utter fool …I managed by saying that I would like to be excused….then when I came back I just dropped the large half-dead cockroach on her chair….blind as she was……she sat on it….& the whole class suddenly burst into laughter….she was rather surprised at this unexpected incident…..for a moment my heartbeat stopped …..if anyone was caught & if he divulged the whole thing…I would be finished…but actually we often laughed at her ……& she was used to getting laughed at….so fortunately for me, she didn’t pursue the matter seriously....

Mischiefs & fooling the teachers was gradually becoming an obsession for me...I derived a strange kind of pleasure & satisfaction from these acts...there were many more such cases & i even got caught in some of them....but managed to escape by my presence of mind & to some extent, because of my academic records.....before I move on to class 11-12, I must make mention of the fact that during class 9-10, I had the fortune to be taught by a teacher who has made a special place for herself in my heart....she is my second favourite teacher....but i liked her as a human being & maybe, even more.....

Also, it was during this period that i found some of those friends whose friendship i cherish even now.....& i wish that they remain close to my heart forever....

In class 11-12, I was one of the regular backbenchers....we had a group of 6-7 boys.....we only made fun & entertained ourselves & the entire class by various amusing activities.....all teachers despised us , were fade up with us & we enjoyed that, man!!!!!!.....I just remember one incident....one day there was very low attendance in the class....only about 20 students had come whereas the normal attendance was 60.....still we had occupied the last 2 benches.....plenty of benches were empty upfront....our physics teacher saw this & said mockingly, "ekdin dekhbo tomra pechhote pechhote dewal bhed kore next classs-e chole gachho!!!!!!".....hahhaaahaa.....that was a wonderful comment.....it had such latent humour & mockery in it.....

It was our maths period…..5 of us were sittin in the last 2 benches & were makin the strangest kind of noises(that of a crow cawing, a dog barking, a cat mewing, donkey braying, pig bleating & would u believ it?...we even went into the extent of resembling dinosaur's shrill sounds...hehehheehee)we were just getting the hell out of that poor fellow!
Finally he became really furious(remember he is basically very cool & composed…..so we went to that extent to make him furious)….& took all of us out, noted down our names, gave us his ph. no. & said that our guardians must talk to him or else he will take some very serious steps ....he even said that he had seen me trying to imitate the mewing of a cat.....(but believe me……I myself nevr imitated a cat's mewing.....perhaps he does n't know the difference between a cat & a dinosaur or a crow!!!!!!hehhehe!!!!).... He was more severe on me bcoz he had seen me doin those acts…we did get away at last but not before a miserable experience!!!!!

So long, I had been fooling my teachers....now here is an incident where I had been fooled....by that time I had become quite an expert in bunking school n classes…but this time I learnt a nice lesson…it really hit me hard……we had a really talented young physics sir & since he too had done all these nasty things in his school-career he also knew how 2 catch us!!!!…..we had his class in the last period…..& before that our stats class…..i bunked that one....thinking I would reach in time before the physics period....then I went hanging around with 2 of my friendz & 5 mins before the end of that period ….i came to our floor & hid at a corner…waitin for the stats teacher to come out…mins. passd by….there was no sign of her…(here I would like to state that our stats teacher never stayed in the class after the bell rung)....after waiting for abt 10 mins....i felt she must have left before the bell & the physics sir might have already started teaching…so I just ran into the classroom but alas!!!!!I could n't believe my eyes....when i found that I had run into that very sir who was coming out alongwith all my classmates with their bags on shoulders!!!!!I had no clue as to what was happening…but that sir, sly as ever, immediately knew what the case was....finding that I was completely bewildered, he explained to me that the stats teacher was absent, so he had taken that period…& then!!!!!!....followed the consequences!!

I had to admit my guilt in front of all the teachers & subhasis said that my father should talk to him that very day…i was in deep waters…if my father came to know about this…he would kill me……that was for sure.....

Finally a person(whose identity i am not going to disclose) helped me out & I am really grateful to him even now…he agreed to act as my father(believe me…its true)…& eventually the matter was solved…so??????......all those stories u hear about "fathers available for different purposes at different rates" are n't rumours after all.....but my saviour did n't take anything from me....he is a very nice fellow....

I was blacklisted in class 11-12.....but I managed to obtain good marks in my final school-leaving exams....after all it is my school.....& it is my duty not to leave that bad an impression on my teachers....strangely enough, I did feel on the last day but they were nowhere near to those feelings that had come streaming inside me on the day of leaving the junior school.....was it because we were more matured or was it because we were less attached....I am n't sure....maybe due to both....

But sure enough, I feel proud to say that I had been a student of South Point for 15 long years right from nursery1 - class 12....Whatever I am today & whatever I will be, I owe a lot to my South Point...Thank u, South Point...I miss u...

thats my high school, SPHS