The Good Old School Days.,,

THE GOOD OLD SCHOOL DAYS… 

I still remember that day when I got punished for the first time for not polishing my shoes, that day when I was made to kneel down for copying and that silly expression of joy when I had stood first in my class. And today, 12 years later, I sit down in front of my laptop to pen down beautiful reminiscences of my school days.

Our beautiful life is mainly made up if three phases: 

School life: 10 years 

Pre-college life: 2 years 

College life: 4 years. 

What we do in these 16 years defines our personality. I lived my 12 years to the fullest and now, as I enter the last year of the very crucial "4 years", my childhood photos made me write this memoir.

As I quickly scurry through my past life, a sense of nostalgia runs through me. I always wish I had a time machine so that I can live my past life again. That life where innocence ruled our hearts. That life where doing maths was fun. That memory of longing for the lunch hour and having lunch in a common lunch room is priceless. That awesome moment when the bell rang and we all packed our bags; the much-awaited break in the form of a P.T period will not easily fade. It is an enriching experience to recollect all the past memories which enliven us, in an otherwise mundane engineering life. 

When I stare at the board full of integro-differential equations, my minds floats back to the days when I used to comment on my geography madam’s drawing of India map which I felt was a herculean task to draw. I miss that maths class where our fingers assisted us in adding numbers. How can I forget the last day of annual exams? How can I forget the unique celebrations and the ink-drenched uniforms? Come June the first and that exuberance and hijinx of the first day of school was pretty cherish able. That excitement of meeting old friends, getting acquainted with the new comers remains etched in my mind. I wonder if I was the only silly person who used to give flowers to my teachers in STD III and when my teacher used to smile back I felt proud of my mother for meticulously arranging the flowers decoratively.

That magical moment of accepting prize in front of a thousand odd gathering is simply one of the moments I always recollect. Anchoring the assembly, giving commands, leading the march-past, I fall short of adjectives in describing these memories. I lost track of time when I entered engineering. Trips, studies and movies have pretty much taken over my life. I need a book to pour my reminiscences but unfortunately I have to put them in the form of a memoir. After a gap of five years, when I was glancing through my childhood photos, a melancholic feeling took over me which reminded me of the good old school days…

Marbles then, Tablets now....

“Dad, I want a footlong paramesan with some mayonnaise sauce and a cookie” said a kid (approx. 8 years old) when I had been to a fast food joint. Then I reminisced my appetite back when I was a kid.”Ammassss, churmuri” was what I recalled.

When I witness this shift between the generations, my mind, subconsciously sets forth for the quest of finding answers and gets lost in the labyrinth of inexplicable situations. I have seen tremendous transformations in the childhood which we lived and the one that today’s kids are going through.

Marble holding hands are transformed into a tablet flaunting hands. Now all the children need to remember is their facebook password. Online games have replaced the good old gully cricket and PSP’s have denied access to playgrounds. There was an air of innocence back then; friendships were not built on materialistic basements but transparent understandings.

With an ambition of cracking the IIT right from their childhood, the children are not exposed to the milieu that we were during our days. With no holds barred life, we grew up in an environment that was undemanding and stress free and I think we have not messed up with our life- everything is hunky-dory.

“My son Adi has a tennis tournament at 10am and a keyboard class later at 1. After which he goes swimming and later attends his tuition classes at 6.” Said Mrs. Sharma to which Mrs. Kulkarni replied “My daughter lost the first place in her class by a whisker even though she had missed her tennis practice and painting classes”. Agreed that every mother wants her child to be a next Navratilova or Michael Phelps, but do they really care about how much impact their aspirations are going to make on their?  

With a plethora of responsibilities and ambitions, the kids today are on their foot every moment of their lives. They have become oblivious to all the fun they deserve. Though this sacrifice may reflect on some aspects, but to what point and purpose?

Childhood is that phase of our life which defines our personality and if they carry the burden of such huge aspirations now, I can only wonder how their adolescence will be!

Though I might seem to be a staunch opponent of the trend, but I don’t have any reasonable doubt in arguing that, although this lifestyle might ostensibly seem to reap success, but it is degrading the quality of life these kids deserve.

Bangalorized..!!

I sprang up to the ominous tone of the alarm at 7 am on a mundane Monday morning. A dreary and threadbare week ahead flashed in my mind. Halfheartedly, I scurried through my daily routine and left home 2 hours early to battle the traffic. Exhausted and languished, I reached my office only to face what was even worse “The Corporate world- A planet where they will lure you into the world of drudgery far away from peace and they will pay you to sabotage your relationships with happiness”.

Welcome to Bangalore, a city packed with millions of hackneyed spirits jostling for free space, where a phony life has taken over an authentic one and crime rates are on an all time high.

With population growing at a rate one has never seen before, Bangalore is nearing saturation and quality of life is deteriorating as the day progresses. Trees are being felled to make way for swanky malls and the good old departmental stores are at their fag end of their life. Slums are accumulating and with that instances of crimes are on the rise as well. This is how Bangalore looks like to an outsider and yet, he decides to dwell in the suburbs of this cursed Silicon Valley of India and the reason is so conspicuous.

People get paid handsomely in return for their happiness and the lust of money has festered their minds. Everyone is in a rat race to earn what is more than necessary. We are dancing to the tunes of a pied piper of Bangalore who has influenced the way we lead our life. Earning has become our supreme motivation for attaining Moksha. “The youth”, which constitutes the indispensable part of Bangalore life, has redefined meaning of Relaxation. Pubs and discos have become the new places for recreation after a grueling five day work. The best of weekend is spent either sleeping or relaxing. A plethora of transformations has struck the city and we have always been excellent to adapt.

A casual evening stroll has been replaced by a frantic chase behind an overcrowded bus; silence of serene parks has been destroyed by phony and zany laughter sessions and especially, we, the youth have been successfully alienated from relationships and passion. We have been successfully transformed into robots, whose life cycle start on a Monday morning and ends on a Friday evening.

The regard for hard earned money is lost and so is the quality of life. People flaunt a western outlook so as to avoid humiliation.

I called my friend after a long time asking him to meet me and pat was the reply-“Silk board traffic sucks dude, sorry to disappoint you. Let’s catch up on fb”. The reason was out of bounds of my imagination.

And, Oh yeah! We still live in Bangalore, not Bengalooru and I won’t quit hoping for that day when we start leading a normal life.