Friday, April 9, 2010

may i drink water?

Everyone is writing about school, so I thought about sharing a few things from school as well. I loved junior school, where the teachers really taught us the beautiful ways of the world. I equally loved high school, which taught us to unlearn and re-learn those ways in a brand new complicated way, while the teachers taught us various subjects.
But this post shall strictly be about certain fun things in school - all true incidents I witnessed.

Drinking water is a major issue in schools as is its opposite - going to the loo. Let me talk about the first one.

Scene: a computer theory class of the 6th grade, in which I happened to be a student. A sleepy yet stern teacher at the desk, who had finished teaching us what the spacebar is.
Teacher: now, everybody will sit quietly and NO ONE will drink water.
(little girl did not quite hear the orders and started drinking from her white-and-green water bottle)
Teacher: you there.. come here.
(little girl gulps the water down and walks up to the desk wondering what will happen)
Teacher: why were you drinking water?
Girl: I was very thirsty, Auntie.
Teacher: I'm also very thirsty. Am I Drinking water?
(girl wonders why. Is staying thirsty the norm ? Or do you have rabies?)
Teacher: go stand in the corner
(girl goes to the corner for the remaining 10 minutes of the class)

I was the little girl of course and I had this real bad reputation among my friends that I was a hard-hearted self-helping little brat who would never break down even if she was oh-for-shame made to stand in the corner. :D

Another such water incident happened in the 8th grade on a very rainy day. Only a handful students turned up and two sections were seated together. The history teacher of our section let us drink water anytime we wanted, thankfully. BUT all hell broke loose if we forgot to ask for permission. She was taking the class when a poor ignorant boy from the other section made the mistake of drinking water without asking the sweet lady.

History teacher: Why are you drinking water without my permission? STAND UP!
(Poor boy fails to come up with anything. He stands helplessly, water bottle in hand.
A second later, the woman realizes that the boy is not from the section she teaches.)
History teacher: Oh you are from section B!!! Why didn't you tell me???
(Silly boy has no answer to this either)
History teacher: Well, sit down!! And if you need to drink water again, ask me first.

The two incidents taught me important lessons in life. Incident number one of course stood for the rules you have to follow even if they are unexplained and cause you inconvenience. The second one is about how you have to adjust with new rules when you move to a new place :P

They are right when they say school makes you ready for the world. Even the most base elements in school contribute to that.

4 comments:

Sukhaloka said...

I like the way you've said "base elements", rather than sticking with the far more innocuous "basic elements" :D

Indrajit Dutta said...

I love this one.

Anoo. said...

i know! ki boro issue chilo school'e 'drinking water'...

Riya Das said...

@suki: yes using "base" was intentional and u know y ;)

@indro: thnx buddy.

@anurima: :) hehe hya... aar ekhon dekh. koto imp class eo dhokdhok kore jol khai. keu patta deyna :P