Out of fashion childhood Stuff

Walking to school and back:
School was 20 minutes of a stroll from home and my folks like everyone else's were not worried about cars running us over. They would only be reasonably worried if we did not turn up home after the street lights came on in the evening ! I used to walk to school for a few years till Dad got a bicycle for me. I usually carried an umbrella along, since it would get very Sunny in the afternoon. The way back was lined with housing blocks, each with a small green lawn in the front and rows of hedges with colorful butterfly bush flowers. I would pluck all the flowers I could and disseminate them into tiny 'flowerlets' to fill my umbrella. Close home, I would open the umbrella over my silly head and stand looking up with glee at a burst of tiny flowers raining on me.

6.7.08 : Ruhi and I found those flowers yesterday in one bylane near Nallagarh Fort in Solan where went for a small holiday !

Making a neighborhood Group to save the world.
As 8 - 9 year old girls, we used to read Enid Blytons like they were going out of fashion. Inspired by Enid Blyton's 'Secret Seven' ( a children's secret society who held regular meetings to solve mysteries that have baffled local police) we started our own secret seven society. In the book series the Seven had a secret password, a badge, and secret headquarters in a garden shed - in our own version we were seven girls though I only remember four names - Gauri, Pallavi, Sujata, Me, ??, ??, ??. We had weekly afternoon meetings at each other's houses by rotation and some mothers (unlike my own ) would actively participate by sending us biscuits and lemonade !

Running amok in school during the recess, like wild animals set free.
The whole school had the recess together - everyone ran out on to the grounds with their tiffins and made their own lunch groups and sat on benches, on the grass, under the tree and wherever else to have their lunch alfresco ! It was one huge informal party in the school grounds. The boys would steal guavas from the trees behind the convent. I remember someone once sneaked to the verandah of the Sister's hostel where washed underclothes were put out to dry. He put guavas under a bra cup and lay it out for display, before running away to safety ! The next day all children were banished from anywhere near the hostel.

Sleeping on the terrace :
For a few years we lived in a flat with a small terrace and in the Summers it was usual to put out the folding charpoys and sleep in the open. I remember learning about the constellations lying wide eyed under the starry blue night. And waking up to a misty pink sky and the cacophony of birds.

Making Janamashtami 'Jhanki' (Lord Krishna's birth story mock up) down to every detail and inviting the neighborhood kids to look at the baby krishna in his basket !

Making chalk Rangoli outside the house on every Diwali 

Playing the games of our times, which lasted till the nineties but are now extinct, at least in Delhi : 

Oonch Neech : The den would announce "oonch" ( high) and all the kids would go scurrying around looking for any surface higher than on which the Den was standing. If the Den said "neech) ( lower).....

Langdi Taang : The 'Den" hopped along on one leg trying to catch the next less abled den

Shivaji cutting the cake : The den chases the kids and while he pursues someone, you dart across the chaser & his prey shouting a war cray ' Shivaji cut the cake' and then the Den chases the one who cut across ! Why Shivaji ? Dunno ! I want to know.

Posham Pa bhai Posham Pa: Two kids would join hands after stretching arms over their heads to make a gate through which the other kids would pass singing 'posham pa..' not sure what's the climax but I think you grab the last kids in your trap as soon as you finish the song 1 

I wrote a letter to my father and on the way I dropped it : Bunch of Kids sit in a circle and the Den goes around dropping the letter ( hanky) behind any one of them. The one who gets the hanky behind them chases the den and if he fails, he circles around with the hanky as everyone sings ' I wrote a letter..."

Vish Amrit : The den runs after the others and curses " Vish" ( poison) and you have to sit down while the others try and pat your head back saying " Amrit: ( nectar) to revive you. But if you get too close to the den, you may be 'vish'ed too !

Chain - chain : The Den ;catches' you and you hold hands till you've got everyone else on the chain chasing those who are left.

Mendhak Choo: The den impersonates a frog by sitting down and hopping along to catch others by extending his leg ! 

Chidiya Ud : 

Chupan Chupai : hide and seek till much after dark running around apartment blocks and playgrounds

Saan Seedi, Patte-pe-patta, Ludo, Carom Board, Teen-do- Paanch, Rummy...

Lots more to add ! Will do so as it comes to me....

Still looking for you, Sr Remegia !

A Merut University Teacher is making News these days. She was involved in a murky game of sex, sleaze and money, or so it seems. Her profession as a Teacher seems to everyone my generation a bit incongruous to her end and how it came. I really wish Teachers came with a lifelong guarantee of remaining in that castle full of glory where kids keep them. Yesterday was Christmas and when Ruhi woke up in the morning she laid claim to the gift under her baby brother’s pillow along with her own since the damn gift was kept in the other foot of her own pair of socks. I told Ruhi that Santa couldn’t make out her socks from Rayyan’s since it was so dark in the room. She believed me. She also believes all that Neena Ma’m her Kindergarten teacher tells her. Sometimes she believes Neena ma’m more than she believes me. I wish that would never never change.

I was a child that you could easily not notice in class. And those days when dull and quiet kids went to hell I really didn’t make it to the approval of any of my teachers in school. Except maybe just a few who remained in the fairy tale that I weaved of my own.

As far back as memory takes me I recall my first teacher was Sister Jane. She was short and very thin. Someone who I now would say had ‘malyalee’ looks. She was soft spoken and very kind to me. Though I remember no act of kindness but I do recall my obsession with her and her great importance in my rather unhappy life as a child. She was transferred to another school and it broke my heart more than others. For several years I wrote letter to her which were sometimes replied to in a letter that would be addressed to all of us mentioning every name…I also recall that every morning all 35 of us were inspected for clean nails, polished shoes, neat hair and ironed uniform. The clumsiest 2 kids were made to stand inside the two tin dustbin boxes on either sides of the blackboard in front of the class. I was a regular in that dust bin along with a motherless boy called Andre Simon. He had pointed yellow teeth and hair that looked like hay. He was so dirty always. I think I stood in the other bin since my shoes were never polished and my socks were soiled. Why did mom had to be so ill always.

The other teacher that I remember was the South Indian Maths teacher in Class 4. Her husband was Dad’s boss in his office and I was particularly bad at Maths. I recall accompanying dad to her house and her making filter coffee for us in a dark and bare room. She had told Dad that I was a “Dream Girl’ and that I would be lost in thought through her class always staring out of the window and completely oblivious to what was being taught….her comment stayed with me. I took it as a compliment…being a dreamer was important in my sad, gray world. And there was so much to see out of that huge window overlooking the school playground and the endless fields beyond…

A really big Sri Lankan woman taught us music. And we would stand in a file like prisoners waiting for the gallows and one by one she would summon us to the Piano and off she went ‘ Do Re Me Fa So La Te Do…..” with each and every child. Her house was so bright and full of sunshine. Wonder why I went to her house though…

When I reached the 9th standard, my class teacher was Sr Remegia. She also taught Biology. Tall and graceful with strong features and black rimmed glasses. I think she was taller than all the men. She was the antithesis of all the other nuns who seemed frail and vulnerable even if they were fat and big. Sr Remegia was strong like a man, opinionated, she could hurt with her tongue and she laughed without a care. Not quite a nun’s behavior. Our favorite gossip those days used to be that maybe she had a short bob of a hair cut under her veil. It seemed most nuns tied theirs in a bun. It was said that she joined the order since she had a broken heart and that the man she loved got married to someone else. She fascinated me. I was madly in love with her and pined for her for many months when she left for Nainital. She came back next year as our Principal. What joy it was. We would sit with her and discuss grown up stuff like relationships and skin problems! A lot us had just about started getting pimply then and I remember she used to say: scrub your face with soap and water and do nothing else! She was never a prude like all the other nuns, we could be ourselves with her.

A few months after we passed out of school and I had come to Delhi since Dad took a transfer, I was told that she eloped with her childhood sweetheart and that the school forbids any enquiries about her. We never again heard of her. Every now and then I google for her. She is never quite off my mind yet…