We are witnessing the worst financial crisis of our times. Big giants like Lehman Brothers are getting bankrupt. One look at the events that led to it, and we see that it's all so funny. Now everybody asks - how the hell could they do such stupid things? No answers, everyone is quite silent about it. I guess it's obvious, at least to those who know the answers, that stupidity comes naturally to men, particularly when they work in groups.
I was in my home-town last week for a vacation. It was a hard-earned 5-day freedom from studies. I got some taste of UP as I travelled both sides by train and spent a few hours in Allahabad both times while waiting for the next train. I enjoyed it a lot too, coz in spite of staying in Lucknow, I was hardly able to get a feel of the local culture because of living on the outskirts of the city and in the confines of a campus that keeps me busy all the time. Being a lover of Hindi language since my childhood, I had always wished that I had been in UP - the heart of the Hindi Heartland - and now, I am in UP, and I am not making the best of my interest in the place. I try my best though, in my own little ways, whenever I get a chance. Sometimes I feel I am interested in too many things. Each one gets only a small share of my time. However, I guess, life's best this way!
One of the things I did during my stay in Bilaspur (my home-town), was to visit my school - the place where I studied for the 12 best years of my life. The last I went there was 6 years back. Thereafter, I stopped going for 2 reasons - (1) It was getting increasingly clear that I was getting bald and I couldn't stand my teachers and the kids constantly staring at my head in surprise. (2) I felt it was not so much fun being in school when you are not a student there.
I had an achievement to boast of this time - something that fooled people into believing that my career has a direction. And now I am more comfortable with my baldness too. Mainly after I got rid of the long strands of hair on the sides which desperately tried to cover the bald patches on top, giving me enough scope to believe everything's alright (though whenever I came to know, that everyone knew pretty well that it was empty underneath, I used to burst into tears that never came out). And I had an emotional attachment with the place, and wanted to see it once again and walk the memory lane for a while. So I was encouraged to visit the school.
The school has undergone lots of changes since I left. It is the same old building, but the where-happens-what has changed. There are 2 TT Tables now (kept in the room that earlier contained jars of preserved snakes and weird animals). There are many new teachers, only a few of those who were there in my time are left. The early morning prayer is quite different now. Earlier we had only the National Anthem and a prayer to God which started as "O My God, Teach me to love you....". There have been 3 additions to this sequence - a sanskrit shlok (Tamasoma Jyotirgamaya), a Hindi song (sung very badly) and another that I don't remember. After that someone reads a Thought of the Day on the mike, then another reads out the news headlines and yet another reads the Fact of the Day. Each child now belongs to one of the 4 Houses denoted by colors. The houses also have names after great leaders. The 'color' system was how it used to be. And I was told that 'someone' wanted the houses to have leaders' names. So now each house has 2 names - one after a color and one after a leader. The children wear badges of the colors of their respective houses, which looks nice as compared to the only-blue badges we had in our time. The houses are allocated in the beginning of the year, based on roll numbers.
There were many other changes that I noticed. I am sure many missed my eye, coz it was a brief and casual glance over the place. Many things had improved, a few looked the same.
The teachers took some time to recognize me and then digest how different I looked. Their stares made me nervous. As I flaunted my newly acquired IIM tag, the teachers got struck with the idea which I was always afraid they would. They asked me to speak to all the school children about career goals, hard-work, motivation and stuff. I showed reluctance, trying my best to show expressions of scare and not of air. It is easy to be misunderstood in this kind of situations. But I am sure I must have screwed up, coz the expressions that usually show up on my face are never what I intend.
I was asked to speak to all the students after the Prayer next morning. I ran back home and slept. I find sleep the best remedy for tension. Then later in the evening, I chatted with Preeta, my educationist friend, who made the entire speech for me in 5 minutes. And Sindhu pumped in some confidence into me. And I was ready to go and deliver!
The next day, after the Prayer, the Principal went to the mike to introduce me. She discovered after she talked some globe about me, that she didn't know my name. With one hand on the mike, she asked me my name, and I had to tell her thrice before she understood half of it. She made some sound to take care of the other half. The children didn't care. It didn't matter to them. And soon thereafter, she asked the children to go back to their classes. She turned and walked back to her office. I was taken aback. What about the speech I had in my pocket? Surprisingly, the kids were still standing, as if they knew what was coming. I quickly grabbed the mike and started with my speech by saying that I'd like to share my experiences and learnings.
The speech went on nicely for about 10 minutes. I talked about the importance of short-term and long-term goals, knowledge, information, internet, extra-curriculars, art, decision making etc. Not sure how many understood what I was talking. The kids, who were standing in the sun, in straight lines with their respective classmates, were looking here and there (The guys were looking at the girls, the girls were looking at me). After about 10 mins of my speech, one girl fell on the ground, dropped unconscious. One Sir, who was standing on the stage next to me, asked me to wrap up my speech soon, otherwise more kids would start falling, according to him. Not because of the speech, but because they come to school without having proper breakfasts, he added. I immediately jumped to the end of my 'prepared' speech leaving whatever I was talking right at that point. The end was 4 lines from a hindi poem (courtesy - our Sanskrit Sir) written by Jaishankar Prasad -
Is path ka uddeshya nahi hai,
Shraant bhavan mein tik rehna,
Kintu pahunchna us seema tak,
Jiske aage raah nahi...
The speech ended. The students seemed very happy. They clapped with full energy. I got down the stage. Came accross Mams. Asked them how it was. They said I spoke well. One mam was laughing a lot. Not sure what the matter was. I said bye byes and ran away before anyone else could catch me.
As I was driving back on my Kinetic Zoom, I felt good about my speech. I made one more addition to my looooong list of career options - Motivational Speaker. Made another mental note - to add this point in my CV for the summer placements - that I gave a motivational speech to school kids.
I am back in Lucknow now, after my short vacation. It's 2nd term of PGP now. New courses, new profs, Summer Placements... Life Rocks!
