Something of Myself
Tuesday, May 18, 2004
Calcutta – august 16 1997, 0845 hours.
H: “do you want to come along or not? Its getting late” how he hates her sense of time-management. Why can’t she ever be on time? I mean its good to be punctual, isnt it? But she hasn’t changed. He has been observing her for the last twenty odd years and she has ALWAYS been late.
G: “I AM COMING. DON’T SHOUT AT THE TOP OF YOUR VOICE. YOU DON’T HAVE TO DO THE HOUSEHOLD CHORES, DO YOU? AND YOUR DAD? HE JUST SITS ON HIS ASS AND READS THE NEWSPAPERS IN THE MORNING? WHY CANT HE HELP ME? HE NEVER HELPS ME”
She started to sob…and recovering her aanchal off the flight of stairs headed towards the car.
D: “Memsahib, at least have this rosogolla!”
G: “go and give it to your sahib…you will all pay for this dearly someday, I am telling you…”
She gets in the car with him sitting in the front seat. He always preferred the front seat from where he could get a clear view of the roads, the people, the traffic – the city. Sitting at the rear seat with her wasn’t an option he would consider normally. An exception would be when he wanted a favour from her. Yes he was selfish just like you and me. They travelled in silence. Uncomfortable silences defined his relationship with her. That’s how it was, that’s how it has always been and that’s how its going to be – change is diabolical.
H: “See you later then. Grab some breakfast at office at least”
G: “Bye.”
He arrived at the portals of an institution where he spends six hours of his day, five days a week; that makes it thirty hours a week and one hundred and twenty hours in a month. Exactly and approximately. Of late he has started to love this place perhaps because he knows the values of being a xaverian, of representing St. Xavier’s at an inter-school competition. He was always very competitive, wanting to bag all the prizes for his school – always aiming higher than his reach but never losing sight of his focus. St. Xavier’s has done him good. It has inculcated in him certain values that he treasures the most in life. of course, now he doesn’t understand the meaning of those values but I am telling you that he will in the near future. The school has offered him a way of life where he is free from all the tensions and frictions of adolescent life in a nucleated family peppered with ego rivalries. Once the gates of St. Xavier’s is shut at 0915 hours, he knows he is safe for the next six hours. He knows the world is his, this world, not the world out there.
As he walks past the prefect’s office, Father Boris calls out to him –
“Hey you! Wait. Come here”
H: “good morning father.”
B: “good morning. You are the one who went for the Inter-School Elocution Contest at Don Bosco last week, didn’t you?”
H: “Yes father.”
B: “Well, I’ve got the results today if you want to know it” (he said it with a grin on his face that begged the question: who wouldn’t want to know it?)
H: “Yes father. Please, please tell me what happened? Did we win father? Father?”
B: “you’ve got the second prize my boy. Well done. Here is your certificate and that’s the medal over there behind that menacing pile of papers.”
H: “Oh. Thank you father.”
He walked away silently with his silver medal and a white certificate bearing the logo of Don Bosco saying that he was the recipient of the second prize. He read it once and started walking towards his classroom – 9E.
He was never happy with his performances especially in curriculars. He wanted to excel, after all he came from a school that held Nihil Ultra as its motto – Nothing Beyond. The words of the school anthem began to ring in his ears – “In dramas, debates, and contests as well, / We boys of SXC do excel…” He was disappointed with himself but consoled by the fact that he had at least something to show his parents when he got back home.
H: “do you want to come along or not? Its getting late” how he hates her sense of time-management. Why can’t she ever be on time? I mean its good to be punctual, isnt it? But she hasn’t changed. He has been observing her for the last twenty odd years and she has ALWAYS been late.
G: “I AM COMING. DON’T SHOUT AT THE TOP OF YOUR VOICE. YOU DON’T HAVE TO DO THE HOUSEHOLD CHORES, DO YOU? AND YOUR DAD? HE JUST SITS ON HIS ASS AND READS THE NEWSPAPERS IN THE MORNING? WHY CANT HE HELP ME? HE NEVER HELPS ME”
She started to sob…and recovering her aanchal off the flight of stairs headed towards the car.
D: “Memsahib, at least have this rosogolla!”
G: “go and give it to your sahib…you will all pay for this dearly someday, I am telling you…”
She gets in the car with him sitting in the front seat. He always preferred the front seat from where he could get a clear view of the roads, the people, the traffic – the city. Sitting at the rear seat with her wasn’t an option he would consider normally. An exception would be when he wanted a favour from her. Yes he was selfish just like you and me. They travelled in silence. Uncomfortable silences defined his relationship with her. That’s how it was, that’s how it has always been and that’s how its going to be – change is diabolical.
H: “See you later then. Grab some breakfast at office at least”
G: “Bye.”
He arrived at the portals of an institution where he spends six hours of his day, five days a week; that makes it thirty hours a week and one hundred and twenty hours in a month. Exactly and approximately. Of late he has started to love this place perhaps because he knows the values of being a xaverian, of representing St. Xavier’s at an inter-school competition. He was always very competitive, wanting to bag all the prizes for his school – always aiming higher than his reach but never losing sight of his focus. St. Xavier’s has done him good. It has inculcated in him certain values that he treasures the most in life. of course, now he doesn’t understand the meaning of those values but I am telling you that he will in the near future. The school has offered him a way of life where he is free from all the tensions and frictions of adolescent life in a nucleated family peppered with ego rivalries. Once the gates of St. Xavier’s is shut at 0915 hours, he knows he is safe for the next six hours. He knows the world is his, this world, not the world out there.
As he walks past the prefect’s office, Father Boris calls out to him –
“Hey you! Wait. Come here”
H: “good morning father.”
B: “good morning. You are the one who went for the Inter-School Elocution Contest at Don Bosco last week, didn’t you?”
H: “Yes father.”
B: “Well, I’ve got the results today if you want to know it” (he said it with a grin on his face that begged the question: who wouldn’t want to know it?)
H: “Yes father. Please, please tell me what happened? Did we win father? Father?”
B: “you’ve got the second prize my boy. Well done. Here is your certificate and that’s the medal over there behind that menacing pile of papers.”
H: “Oh. Thank you father.”
He walked away silently with his silver medal and a white certificate bearing the logo of Don Bosco saying that he was the recipient of the second prize. He read it once and started walking towards his classroom – 9E.
He was never happy with his performances especially in curriculars. He wanted to excel, after all he came from a school that held Nihil Ultra as its motto – Nothing Beyond. The words of the school anthem began to ring in his ears – “In dramas, debates, and contests as well, / We boys of SXC do excel…” He was disappointed with himself but consoled by the fact that he had at least something to show his parents when he got back home.
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