05 September 2006

Remembering my teachers on teachers' day

To remember my teachers,
First comes my father, then my mother!!
Yes. My Father used to teach me math and science
And my Mother, music. In my school, there were some teachers who stayed permanently in that school. Some had experience of over 20 years, some 30 years!!
It was too good to be learning from all of them. There was a specific teacher to a specific class. Like Padmathamma for nursery, Muniyappa for 1st standard, Ramakrishnamachar(Swami master) for 2nd standard, Doreswamy for third standard and so on...
For us math, science and social science would start from third standard onwards. Till then we used to learn how to read and write, playing so many games, some rhymes, songs and stotras!
I still remember the Kannada rhyme which goes like this: "Baro Baro maLe raya... bAleya toTake nErilla"(This was taught when there was no rains during the monsoon season as a prayer)!
Oh! How good those days were!
We were not allowed to enter the classrooms with slippers. This was just because we needed to treat the classroom as a prayer hall or as a temple. What a sacred feeling. Teachers also would leave out their slippers outside just before entering the classroom.
On the classroom walls there used to be good sayings written allover and the teacher would light an insence stick(sambhrani kaddi) the first thing in the morning; what a good practice!
Later on as we entered 5th standard, our teachers introduced us to grammars and freedom struggle and so many other things.
There was a strange incident once in a social science class. Every one of us was given a portfolio in a mock ministry. I was made the chief minister and some of the others cabinet ministers and some state rank ministers; we were all asked to read newspaper and write down something about the then ministers of our portfolios!
What a novel way of introducing one to political science!
oh! How can I forget MVenkatappa! he was our English teacher. Since it was a remotest village and most of the parents being illiterates, English teaching was the toughest job of all. But this teacher was, I consider him to be, successful in planting the English seed in most of us. We started learning English in 5th standard.
He used to prepare small post cards and distribute it to all the students, guess what he would write on it?! Name of the person it was distributed to! And more, he would take time, write it in bold with sketch pens so that the stamp always remains in the minds rather than the paper. Some people left English learning at it, sadly and some moved on to be IAS officers!!
All the above facts were of the Govt. primary school. I don't think they still maintain the standard of teachers as it was in our times!

Then the high school. It was a good platform for our analytical development. Apart from just studies, as sadly so many schools now a days prefer, we had so many competitive programs in singing, reciting, cultural, educational, recreational, vocational, sporting and others like drama.
There used to be a science competition for which we used to prepare for over a month. Participants would come from allover the district and it used to be a very nervous time to perform (teach in science) in front of so many judges and teachers! We all learnt so many things, apart from just the exam-lessons, from these programs.
I thank all of my teachers who made these moments momentous and confidence building moments.

Then the college, National College Basavanagudi. I think its better to keep quiet than go in detail about each and every person who made an impression there. It was everyone who made it a great stay in that college, In spite of tough competitions from the private tuitions, we used to go there just to attend classes,
U would've all read their text books, PL Seetharam(PLS, Zoology) and Y Tulajappa(YT, Botany), there was one Anantha Rangan(AR, Math), one MSVR, one SVSubba Rao(SVSR, chemistry), one SBalachandra Rao(SBR, Maths), one ShakuntaLa(English), one DShashidhar(DS, English)....list grows...
Best part of my stay in NCB was the NSS activities, dramas apart from other things.

I will leave out my Engineering days to be listed on some other occasion. The post is already a Hanuman tail(hanumanthana baladante agide).

7 comments:

Shruthi said...

Very nice post! Chappli biTTu classroom voLage hogodanthu.. too good.

Srik said...

Also,
There used to be a monitor for each class. He would prepare a time table for each one in the class, with the help of the class teacher, of cource, and he would be responsible for making sure that time table be implemented. You know what would be there in the time table? Yes, daily two students of the class (including the monitor himself) would be chosen and the responsibility of cleaning the class room would fall on them for that day. They should be in 30 mins early and prepare the class room for the classes. Others would simply come early and play out. The cleaning business just didn’t stop at the class rooms alone, on special occasions like Aug15th, Republic day, and other days, we(5th, 6th and 7th students) used to sweep the campus, the prayer auditorium. We also had a small temple of Ganesha in that area of the campus. Every Friday evening there used to be a Puje to that Lord and some bhajans would be taught.

I wonder today was that really a school?! There was no home work given, there was no big punishment like get out of the class and such things, teachers used to hit on the palm for about 5-10 times, based on the type of crime commited. Teachers used to be compassionate, dear to the children, passionate about teaching, about the innerent Indian culture, pride of being Indian shown up on each’s place…! How good it was!!
Those leasures eagerly awaited, those ball-badminton games, those volley ball compititions, those kho-kho practices early morning!! Those strict environs, those scientific experiments, the upma prepared for the afternoon lunch for poor children of the school, those eagerly awaited ring of the bell..! those dedicated classes for Kannada grammar, maggi(arithmetic tables), English speaking, writing letters, learning the proverbs(Gadhe), good habit and personality development classes, horticulture classes, the mass dumbell, drill chimes programs…!!! Amidst all these we didn’t have time for cricket, but for lagori, gilli-dandu, mara-kothi on those large tamarind trees. Teachers had nothing to do in all these things..they would tell us off-line to play these games instead of marbles and other gambling kind of stuffs.

One of the teachers(Swami master) used to tell us stories from mythology or from chandamama genere, every Tuesday 4 to 4:30 in the evening. There was a bench in the ground where he used to sit and tell us his stories, and we used to sit allaround him just to listen to him explain. Most of the stories would be in Telugu and yes, sometimes in Kannada too.
I could just go on listing so many other things.. but let me stop here..! ooops...I'm getting over nastalgic here...!

Anonymous said...

Nice post.. came here thru RK's blog...what year were you at NCB?... don't remember any of these names... of course class ge hogidre thane.. remember Anantha Rangan .. he used to teach us Trigonometry.. "Kaaas theeeeta kano katthe"

My NCB was '79-'80.. S.Desikachar was the principal..

Best part of my NCB days (other than the college itself) was the daily lunch trip to Vidhyarthi Bhavan :-)

Srik said...

Vijay,
Hahaha :)
Vidyarthi bhavan stuff. Yeah it comes as attached string to all the Gandhi bazar frequenters, especially NCB students :)

I was in NCB b/n 95 and 97. Deshikachar was retired by the time I started there :(. I;ve read his text books though.

Thanks for visiting. Pls do come again.

Anonymous said...

I don't remember reading this post. Very nostalgic. I would also write on these lines , mine is a photo blog so I need to do lot of researching finding for photos.. I have many group photos.. Those school photos where my class teacher & head mistress used to sit in the middle & we are all standing/sitting according to each other's tallness! Wow! srik this was amazingly beautiful ;-)

caas teeTa kaNo katte was too much! teeTa theorems are all good memories to cherish.. Tution teachers bagge barililla ? I have so many things to say about my tution master in my standard 10th. Mr. Nagaraja Rao.. I have no clue where is he now. He was a retirned HM from a school from some K R Nagara is what he had told me.. Great Guy! I used to many times think why can't my dad be like my sir! he was like wow! I don't have any words to say...

Anonymous said...

Very well written post. I was in NCB too but way back between '71 & ' 74. Do you know the name of the person who was the Princi then? I have his pic but cant remember his name at all!! Do you know anyone who was in Mahila Seva Samaja too? We had a Sanskrit meshtru with a juttu and a perennial hoarse throat. We used to call him thuppada gantlu. He hated us and we hated him. Then we had a sangeethada meshtru Subba Shastri who would doze off all the time. Invariably his class would be post lunch. We would purposely sing loudly to wake him "Lam BO dara, laku mikara. Am BAAAAA sutha amarvinutha.." shouting the BO and BA in a chorus. He would wake up for an instant and snooze off again with his head/juttu resting against the window sill. My friend and I often took a string from the needlework box and tied his juttu securely to the window grill. I feel so bad now. Children can be so cruel sometimes!! When the bell rang, he would suddenly wake up clutching the end of his kachhe panche in one hand,cane in the other and scream with pain.

Anonymous said...

Today suddenly I remembered Anantha Rangan, in National college. Sometimes I used feel sleepy and he used as questions pointing at me!