Friday, April 18, 2014

New Beginnings

Kavya was sticking close to me. We were sitting in a circle. The teacher and nine three year olds, eight mothers and me. The teacher was trying to get the younger ones involved in some rhymes. Voice was barely cracking out of my mouth and Kavya, sensing my discomfort, was quiet. She was watching the unfolding drama of bewildered toddlers and awkward adults trying make sense of it all. We were in Kavya's new school, Shishuvan and it was first day of the new school.

Only a couple of years back, to the collective horror of our parents and friends, we were thinking of home schooling Kavya. School, we realized did not really work for us. We spent years in numb classrooms, day dreaming and dreading the teachers index finder when it did the Russian roulette, hoping that it did not stop at us. Slowly and steadily we were institutionalised and domesticated. We learnt not to trust our instinct and in return were made to feel mildly competent to be slaves to a modern society. But our big hopes started evaporating when the commitment of raising a child 24x7 started staring in our face coupled with the complete resistance from our families. We would not send her to a regular school for sure. Alternative schools are not a rage in Mumbai and when we started looking, there were only two choices, Tridha or Shishuvan. It was easier to get into Tridha, but we did not want Kavya to spend her afternoons sleeping in a school bus so it left us with Shishuvan. The other schools, we decided were too commercial or too academic to be of any consideration.

And Shishuvan did not disappoint us. I liked the more traditional sounding name of the school and the classes and the uniforms with Indian prints, fusing the modern and the ancient. The school seemed to have a very strong and clear philosophy (with a bias for Powerpoint presentations). Even though I went to a catholic school, I have grown to have a post-colonial world-view. Fed by a range of recent writing on the Asian awakening and my family's Gandhian background (my grand parents wore khadi), I have learnt to ask uncomfortable questions about our complete cultural submission to the West. In that sense, Shishuvan did not seem to be a sell out.

But the English rhymes were still a bit hard to swallow. English was still the oppressors' tongue and a language of exclusion for the masses. Politics had entered early into Kavya life and I could only watch helplessly as she was getting prepared to get groomed into an elitist class, just like me. She might grow up thinking in English too, I sighed, slightly afraid of being a radical and yet unwilling to submit fully. Ending up, like many others, resigning to the fact that I had the ability to do neither.

Kavya was still taking time to settle down and was not fully buying into the rhymes either. Not that I minded it. A bit of scepticism for institutions was a healthy sign. The teachers were getting a bit worried though, so were other parents, who were sympathetic since I was clearly struggling to get her comfortable in class. Soon the other parents started dropping out. We spent one full class sitting against the wall, watching other kids do the rhymes. It was only when our chance came to paint, we participated with others. I could see Kavya big round eyes absorbing the new surroundings, only occasionally wanting to poke into the proceedings, fearful of what reactions that might have.

The worst was yet to come. The next day, Kavya would not come out on her own. So Rajitha decided to join us with her big tummy carrying another tiny baby. As soon as we reached the class, Kavya decided to give her best and most ferocious howl. She was not going in. Unfortunately on the day before, she had to be dragged into the classroom and today she was making sure that there was no way she would be dragged. So we had a deal. We would stand outside and only "check out" what was happening. Since I was the only parent, I decided I would not go in. So I picked her on my hip and we stood outside the class, watching through the glass door. The teacher was doing a neat trick. She conjured up a water melon from under a napkin and sliced it into small pieces for the kids. Thankfully, one small piece was sent outside for us. Kavya seemed to like that.

Then came the opening.

We will go in tomorrow, she told me. I could hardly believe my luck. I was preparing for another day of standing out, so I made her repeat it. And she said it alright, she would go in tomorrow. So we happily stood out for the rest of the hour watching other kids go through the motions. We were now prepared for what was to come. And we had done pre-school too and this seemed more of the same - rhymes and some fun. The next day, she did make some noises before going in, but they were very feeble. The day after, she was annoyed that the door was closed (since we were a bit late). 

Now she is fully settled in. It was a tough balancing act, but I think we did okay.







3 comments:

Unknown said...

Hi Rushabh

I am Ajit Naik (Aarya’s Father).

This is one the best blogs that I have read.

Looking forward for your next blog

sonia said...

Hi this is sonia (diya savla) mom . It was great reading ur blog. Too good. Waiting for ur next blog. Thanks

rushabh said...

@Ajit, @Sonia - glad you liked it :) thanks for commenting!