Idhar Udhar Ki Baatein

I was about 8 when my brother graduated High School. And I was pretty excited for him to calculate and reveal to me the year I would do the same. The magical year was to be 2010.

I liked it. A nice round number. And the beginning of a new decade. I decided that it would be a landmark in my life. I would turn 18 years old-an adult, for starters. I would enter College. And on my way to getting there-2010, I'd have done a lot of things. And I'd be leaving school behind!

For quite a while, leaving school behind and finally "beginning" my life was something that excited me all the time, till I turned 15 I guess.

I began realizing that this "safe" world wouldn't come back. And I decided that I would make every day count.

That didn't quite go as planned! Because life happened...

And as much as I wanted, it is really hard to try stopping time! Nope, I'm not talking about stopping time during Sondhi Ma'am's Science tuition classes :)

Tomorrow, I will attend my "Farewell and Valedictory Ceremony" in School. All I can ask myself right now is - when did I grow up? How did I manage to reach "right now"? Is it really happening?

I had heard of this day. A lot of times! And I had seen my "Seniors" go through the same passage of rite.

I know I know. My life hasn't ended! But I feel like I'm leaving a part of myself and moving on, moving ahead.

Carmel Convent. This name shall remain forever, synonymous with the word School for me. Some may murder me for saying this, but CCS is definitely not the best school there is. Many a time, I felt it was not a place that would appreciate every individual. I was a part of the crowd. Looking back, I wonder how many teachers in that school of mine in Chandigarh will remember my name and face for a long time to come. Maybe four. Or maybe I'm underestimating my teachers! I don't remember being chosen to do something. It took me years to finally be asked to go bring the notebooks from another room! But that would be a personal experience.

Yet those are not the memories I'll attach with my school.

Carmel Convent gave me friends, ones I will cherish for life. [Won't continue writing this point because if I start, I won't finish!]

Carmel Convent gave me this ... weird discipline for prayer. I say weird because, although we would have the prayer assembly through the PA system every morning, it's not like we never made fun of it or thought it was ridiculous! I'm sorry, but sometimes, us kids, we tend to make a joke out of a lot of important things. But the "prayer" part I'll miss for life.

Carmel Convent did make me fear breaking the law! I think in Chandigarh, we were known to be one of the more lenient schools (at least when compared to Sacred Heart :D ) But still, the whole fear I developed about being "caught" by the "Cabinet wali didi" (a phrase that always caused my brother to ask me-Why do you call them that? Do they live in Cabinets?"). When I joined Carmel in Delhi, it took me a while to get used to the ... lack of discipline! I'm not complaining, but it was strange :)

Carmel Convent gave me Christmas Carols :-D Yes, a weird thing to remember your school for! But Christmas was one of the most fun events in the academic year. Singing carols was even better! The *spirit* of Christmas was all around!

Now, things I'll definitely miss that were not quite part of the academic ... field are :

Sitting in the ground, in winter, with the sun's warmth on backs-gossiping like there was no tomorrow; Singing the School Anthem :); Panicking big time before the exams; Studying in the last moment and yet having time to ask your friends "Kitna kar liya?" and more recently, having time to go update your Facebook status in the midst of studying for the exam; Waking up in the morning to find that the day is being declared a holiday :); Copying the homework off some other kid who'd done it right in the morning [with me, my biology notebook through classes 7th-10th used be in demand :| ]; Roaming around in my school uniform [Yes, I know I'm weird :D]; [This part is more relevant to the lower classes but yeah :D] The whole group-ism wala issue-weird hierarchy :D I actually remember fighting along with my friends with a buncha "seniors" who were claiming our hop-scotch territory-one of our amazing points to win this "fight" was "my friend is our class topper, beat that!" We were 9 years old-go figure!; Okay this could be that unique weird reason-having really bad stomach ache that your mom teaches you the whole course for a Social Sciences exam which you end up topping *Yey!*; Getting amused when your classmates ask you to speak in Tamil because they just realized to their utter amazement that you are in fact Tamil!; That impending danger of your tiffen-box finishing in record time because it contained Dosas/Idlis, leaving nothing for you to fill your tummy with; Passing around chits in class so you could have a conversation with your friend :D

There is SO much more I want to write because this is definitely not it! And this shall be continued in my next post which will (hopefully) be posted real soon!