How I Learnt Learning
And Announcing...The Next Performance...
continued from-Do We Need This Nightmare???
“And announcing, the
next performance, by grade 7! They have prepared for the dance since two
months…missed precisely what they came to school for…tired and drained their
bodies for a two minute performance…and not actually learned any kind of
dance…the ones who were good shall enjoy the centre while others, who have
spent as much time and money as the supposedly superior, will just shake their
hands in random movement…”
Only if the anchor was
frank enough!
“And now 22 children
shall play the cricket game we all were waiting for! 22 shall be playing…and
ten to twelve students who have wasted their days practising in the scorching sun
shall go about standing idle…giving water…imagining that they shall be on the
field soon…they be the thirteen, fourteenth or fifteenth man and walk
dumbfounded cheering for others…hoping someone will cheer them someday…”
Only if the commentator
was frank enough!
Today is the sports day
and we are going to have lezim and the heats…hurdles, sprints and relays! We
have spent incredibly large hours wasting time on the creation of this sports
day. Teachers have missed their lectures and are unable to finish their
portion…which makes them exceedingly frustrated. We have called for a special
chief guest, who in my view has by hearted his plastic speech for the sports
day. The events are highly disorganized…while on one end the prize distribution
goes on, on the other end is the relay race…the parents sit a mile away from
their children…and this is going to be a regal disaster…
Only if the reporter
was frank enough!
Copy paste all this into one block and highlight the words
for me
“I AM FRANK ENOUGH!!!”
And truly this was a disaster… let’s begin with these
functions in the school I attended when I was a primary student…the sports
day…annual day…extracurricular activities were a la grande! The premises being too small, and fees and budgets
being very high, extravagant auditoriums and gigantic grounds were the
locations for these events…
Earlier it was fun…it was great to stand on the stage and
dance! Okay, not dance exactly but at least stare at the crowd in front of me…a heap of people piled onto one another on
chairs and terraces is a better way to describe the situation!!!
It was fun
being the Tin Man from the Wizard of Oz and an Alien too…telling those miniature two
sentences…in front of a crowd! An exposure, well! It was a great experience to
receive awards…
Later on, it grew into a mess and a chaos…or maybe it always
existed but I was too naïve to understand the actual scene behind the glamour!
I think the latter fits the puzzle!
I actually remember entering the stage, for my fifth grade
annual performance through the wrong
wing!
Come on! We
actually practised and practised and
practised for months in particular positions and sides and on the final day
we actually end up dancing in spots we never expected! And just because the
teacher was unaware of the wing and corresponding positions? Why wasn’t there a
coordinator? Why no arrangement? Why no discipline? Why such a hurry?
But here we talk about the hard work, actually wasted!!! But what about those whose money and time were
wasted? Some children actually were on the back of the stage just fumbling and
doing nothing!
Maybe they were embarrassed or felt awkward dancing! They
felt inferior! They felt as if all the importance, screen space and attention were
for the central and first row guys! Why? Because they wanted to fit 25 students
on a small little stage? Because they wanted to just get it done! Anyways only
the galore matters, doesn’t it?
The students and
parents don’t actually get any kind of consideration! Their work is never
acknowledged because at the very beginning of their lives, at the point when
they are creating a personality, that they will bear for many years to come,
they will lose confidence! Self-esteem!
Dignity!
The feeling of “I am
someone important” is gone…or never actually created! Or given rise to!
Why? For the only reason that the school was more interested in creating
headlines and have the most glorious annual day, than in nurturing the child’s
skills!
If a child is good at
dancing, make him dance! But not those who hate it and is not their cup of any
beverage!
Let the child
speak…he may have excellent oratory skills…maybe he is an exceptional
singer…maybe he is a very confident anchor! Maybe he has some skills that can
actually enhance the actual quality of the annual day rather than the galore
and splendour!
Rather than
making parents spend and run after dresswalas!
Rather than a boy or girl just standing at the back and rolling their arms…just
waving their hands and weeping for no reason at all!
Wait a minute!
There is a reason! The reason is…the child does not at all want to be a part of
what he is a part of! He wants to speak those lines that a fool fumbled in a
play before them…and the one who fumbled, he wanted to dance! But does it
matter?
There are huge
tables kept and mikes in front of them. 10 children sing into one mike! How
many are heard? Actually speaking none or maybe hardly one or two…the ones
closest to the mikes! Some are just giving lip
sync to the song…because one girl out there wanted to be a part of the
anchoring team! But no! No entry because you have been told to just sing! And
that’s final.
We do see movies
that say, “Let children do what they want in life!” So, why just in life? Why
not in our annual days that make us do things we don’t want to and just for the
sake of it? Why is the focus completely on the schools accomplishments and what
the school has been doing instead of what children of parents who pay the
school (without whom it is just a building and not any kind of institution!)
have won…the school has got award for the best school or whatever…why this? Why
not the students’ accomplishments…
One thing that bugged me and continues doing so is the
attendance award! Cycles and huge trophies for just being the most regular one!
To just come every day! It’s like a forum awarding a member who comments and
replies and gives baseless stupid inputs, for being active! And someone who is
enhancing the quality of the forum is being excluded! Schools were doing just
that! I was quite regular in school, I missed some days but was regular with my
results, too!
But there
were junooni parents who actually
made their children be dragged to school to get that God forsaken award! My
parents were lenient and told me to be the best in my study work! Because at school, what we thought was that is
what actually matters! We were wrong! All that mattered and deserved prizes
were best attendance! Awards for coming to the school!
And then we have commercials made for these things…use this
amazing soap or tissue or liquid and your child will get attendance awards! He
will be regular!
Come on now if the TV says that we should strive for these
stupid awards, we need to! If not buy the soap we send them daily…my friends,
coughing, sneezing, puking, would say, “We attend school so that we can get the
award for best attendance!”
And now, I be
like “What the hell???” they actually wanted that damned thing! One of my
friend’s mothers actually fought with the principal to get her child a
consolation best attendance award for he had only missed half a day! Whoa! That’s
hilarious but also insane!
If I had to rate my parents on the scale of 1 to 10, based on
dragging me to school, making me not take any holidays if I felt not well or
was tired, when I was part of the school, for a futile award, I’d give them
zero…thank you for never doing such a thing, and then six months back, doing
such a wonderful thing for us!
I am more concerned not
for the fact that best attendance is actually an award because there are no real awards for children who
have done so damn well in what the school is actually supposed to make them do!
The exams! The results! No felicitation for those who actually worked so hard
to get those marks! Waiting and hoping forever that someday they will be
awarded!
Although, my previous one was quite anti-exams-in-schools but
I feel strongly that if the school is making children study, why let the work
go unnoticed! I secured 96.45 and 97.14 percentage in both my semesters in
fifth, respectively! And what did I get? Nothing? Teachers said, “Congrats”
some came up to specially congratulate me! Some patted me on the back! It’s a
feeling that I got at those times, which is irreplaceable…but what about those
awards?
Isn’t it actually
neglecting someone? Shouldn’t the ones showing improvement be told that “You are good!” that will do…the
announcement on the mike is a feeling that many strive for…some need it and
some want it! For that they do extraordinarily well…not only in studies but in
sports, drawing, origami, singing, music, dance and drama! But is it being told
to the one thousand parents? The next day, the names are forgotten…the awards
are forgotten…but it will definitely leave a lifelong imprint in the mind and
heart of the child “I am Special!”
It is a feeling that every child desires…but the child is
kept away from it for reasons…
The student wants to be a part of the drama. He is fluent…he
has amazing oratory skills…but no! Why? Why, because another child who is the
best friend of the Co-ordinator’s son? Because they are bunch of people who
have been doing it since a really long time? Why not introduce new talent? Why
not allow others who want to be seen on stage, and maybe emote really well…what
can this be called? Partiality? Yes, precisely! They do not want a child to
fumble…however good he may act! Why not allow a child to make mistakes? If one
doesn’t make mistakes, how does he learn? How does he grow?
And for the dances, the centre is only reserved for those who
the school believes should be the highlight…or be seen because the ones at the
back, however tall they may be are just invisible! I was always a part of the
anchoring in kindergarten and then always from the second to fourth grade…what
I realized was that the exposure that I got, the two lines as an Alien, maybe
three or four as the Tin Man, I got the confidence to speak in front of that
many people!
This, I was happy with…earlier I told about
the children who missed the chance to do this…why didn’t everyone get a chance
to give it a try and at least take their first steps into public speaking! Why
wasn’t everyone given a chance to explore? At least, there was a provision that
everyone could participate in everything…an eighth grader, in the last annual
day I attended of that school, on the top of his voice was screaming for claps!!!
More louder! More louder! It was wrong English but at least he was freely
expressing…
In the latter school, there was nothing that I could call as
true exposure! The decisions of what a child shall do, was not at all in the
hands of the child but in the hands of the teacher in charge…and the only
motive that they had, actually was to finish of the Annual Day once and for
all…
In the former school; it was grandeur and glory! But here, it
was a function of the humblest of sorts…and more than humble it was just a
formality!
Earlier it was showing off extensively and here it was
finishing it once and for all…the chaos and problems were the same and disorganization
an integral part of the Annual Day! Here, it wasn’t partiality; it was imposing
something on children. Imposing what they wanted us to do…rather than we
deciding what we actually want to do…
What I wanted to do, never happened in any of the events that
ever took place! I was always given roles in language since my oratory skills
were good…but not in English! In another vernacular language I better not
mention…
Four events, all including portraying skills like language,
reporting, acrobatics, dance (which can also be defined as the throwing and
swinging of students from one place to another, where all modern dance forms
are now leading us to)…and for all I was in the language activities for my
speaking skills…only for the first time I was in English…and for the rest of
the three in a language I hate…maybe because I had to bear it for six long
months…two months’ practise for each event! It was so jarring and so
frustrating to do something I didn’t want to!
It was like I was counting notes and making entries rather
than cooking or something else! I felt like actually missing days…I would see
some acting in English dramas...speaking pathetically, I am no one to judge but
when you are in a position, where you see someone doing what you could have
done…and done better…a feeling that is inevitable! It comes when you see
Federer playing tennis…and you sit in your living room on your laptop making a
presentation for your meeting next week….when you could have played with
Federer!
Well, at least you could have tried…my dad’s book explains
this better…but here, there was no trying…just accepting fate! Hopes, feelings,
desires, were just not allowed! I still
think that if I would have been in the English plays…or at least been made the
anchor…or written the script for the presenters and performances, it would have
been a better disaster; at least I would be happy I would have done something I
wanted to…I wouldn’t have to do something that the school wanted me to do!
Nonetheless I would have at least written a script with some
sense of humor! It’s that feeling that always remains!
Wasn’t the Annual Day or any such event supposed to be for
enriching a child? For letting the child express what he/she wants to? For
making the student confident? For letting the children do something that they
will like seeing himself doing?
An event that occurred that I shall narrate to you…it was
annoying and the worst behaviour any school could or would portray…
For the last Annual Day
in my last school, I was stuck again with that same language…an old
man…honestly speaking it was another version of Dilwale Dulhania Le
Jaayenge…I was the Amrish Puri (father of the girl)…my friend was the Shahrukh Khan (a newspaper boy), and the
girl, the Kajal of the movie…the only
difference being the boy and girl become brother and sister at the end and that
there was no train…instead of me throwing grains to pigeons, the boy is
watching television and remembering his bad old days! This was the best way I
could’ve explained to you this horrible and atrocious story ever!!! In which I
was made to act…on the last day of the rehearsal, I was told to bring a stick
(remember, I was an old man!) for no apparent reason! The most creative way
according to them to show an old man was a man with a stick!!!
And my stick had become
a fantasy for all the boys in the class...I had gone to the washroom, I was
walking into the class and a ruffian, swung the stick…I was totally unaware
what was going on! The stick hit the eye lid of my right eye…the impact was
huge and it began bleeding…I knew what I had to do…I always did…
Firstly, I rushed to
the washroom to clean my eye with cold water to avoid a bump. I was in pain…I
ran to the medical room…one thing I was grateful to the school for. The nurse,
who was well aware of my condition, applied ice packs on my eye and my parents
were called immediately…a bump was sure to be formed. I lay on the bed and
within a few minutes my parents had arrived. My mom and dad were very worried.
They had been concerned even if something small happened to me and told me to
be careful always…
But then it had been a
strike on my eye that would swell into a huge lump. Many teachers and Co-ordinators
had already gathered there. The Principal was in a meeting and refused to
come…my dad made her come...afterwards I was taken to the doctor…the doctor
casually told a lump would form and nothing was there that could’ve been done…
I had slept at
home…later on we went back to the school! Why it had happened? Why the chaos?
Why ask for a stick?
What happened in the
meeting was a terrible thing. The Principal, supposedly of a huge institution,
seeing that I had a huge lump on my eye…and I could barely open it, and hardly
walk…she asked us, “Will he perform in the Annual Day tomorrow???” What???
Seeing that I was not even able to see form
the other eye, she wanted me to perform in the Annual Day? She wanted that I
should actually go and act in that wretched drama with only half my eyesight?
She wasn’t concerned about the pain? Instead of telling me to rest and
apologising for the thing that had happened she actually was asking me, in
front of my parents who were frightened and afraid to act! She said, “I’ll
announce his name!”
Whoa! “Like I performed
even though I was in pain!” And we, this school are the first to have someone
do like this! Headlines???
They couldn’t see the fright! They
couldn’t see the pain! They couldn’t see what we all were going through and
actually not understanding the gravity of the situation of what had happened!
All that was important was that their annual day should happen and there
shouldn’t be any hiccups! That they actually expected my parents who were so terrified,
to sit and be a part of the annual day, and me to actually go on the stage and
perform? Real mature?
The school authorities didn’t care that I would be going
around with a black eye for an entire month? That for a week I will be going
about holding an ice pack on my eye? And what for? An Annual Day? A drama? A
play? A stick to portray me as an old man?” no one was truly concerned how I was!
No one asked if my eyesight would function well? No one was concerned if I would
be able to see! No one was, understanding or wanting to understand the pain I was
going through…
On the next day, the counselor literally called us up. “Is
Shahen going to come today and perform? I am waiting for him at the school gate
to take him in.” Even after telling that I would barely be able to see, that I was
having a huge lump on my eye, the counsellor was audacious enough to call us up
and ask us if we would be able to come! And they expected a YES???
So this was the grand Annual Days we were told to be a part
of! Where we could express all we wanted! Where there was no partiality! Where
everything was organized! Where everyone could do what they wanted to! Where
students were given more importance than the school! Where the school
authorities were so very mature!!!
From The Same Series...
How I Learnt Learning...
Good Morning Continues...
~Let's All Assemble~
All Assembled, Now The Suffer Begins...
English Vinglish
performed by Shahen Pardiwala
©Shahen Pardiwala. All Rights Reserved.
