Nostalgia -1

Teachers have always left more impact on me than any other clan in school, during my school days.

Neither friends nor seniors or any other group could affect me the way they did.
Though I was late in realizing how lucky I was in being at a place like that, spread across the world, Kendriya Vidyalaya, a chain maintained by the KVSangathan under the govt. of India.
Such qualified and trained teachers! Such dedication and friendliness!
I see my comrades in school walking away to distant places to work now. Miss that place.

I remember, the first class there..
I went in with dad and my friend Frijo who was my classmate from the KG classes and his dad, and was worried to find everyone crying. Man, I went over and consoled some who were crying.. And then settled down, grinning at my dad who was standing at the door. Dad grinned back.
He came over and introduced me to G3, Moorthy uncle's daughter and asked me to make friends with her. I was determined to not like her the very instant and ran over to some other place right then oblivious to anything he further said. That day starts the 17 year old 'snake-mongoose' friendship between me and her.

After everyone settled down, my first class teacher there "Ms. Sujatha" came in with some books and attendance register. She took the attendance and asked the parents to leave.
My dad left too. She introduced herself and started off with the Social Studies text. I started getting uncomfortable. It is one thing to have dad and cry and another to not see him and feel insecure. Almost all had settled down cos no one gave a damn about the crying anymore. No one was there to see anything of that sort. And the class teacher strategically ignored every single one of those cry babies. So everyone had finally settled down.

And then I cried. I missed dad. And put a stop to all class activities and got up to tell her I wanted to see dad. She tried saying he had gone to get some books. I countered saying I went with him to get all the books myself. Finally she had to make me believe dad had gone to get some books out of list for me. And had to give toffees to make an argumentative me shut up.

From there, the journey was pretty happening with English teachers being my favorite and them showing favoritism to me as well. ;) I remember Leela ma'm who would shout at me for every silly mistake I made and gloat over my marks, in 5th.
Then Sivadasan sir from 4th, who would give me pinches with his inches long nails for stupid mistakes like "writting" and still make me the tutor of weak students in the class.
Goes into 9th where Ms. Joan Bridgett Jose who would not mind anyone knowing I was her fav. I remember presenting my first [publicised] poem in the class one day. And getting appreciated. She stopped all her work to listen to my poem. :D
And then Ms. Clotilda Roacha, in 10th, who would not lose any opportunity to shout at me [or the class in general.] but at the end of the year, she called me to tell me it was all for good. :)

[Contnd]