Keshav goes to school

"My parents are such heartless brutes!!"

I kept thinking the whole night as I tossed and turned in my bed wondering what my fate was to be the next day.

I had overheard a few days ago that they had enrolled me in some school. I did not pay much heed to it as I did not imagine that it was for now. I mean, who sends a one year old.. ok ok.. a 14 month old baby to school!!

Through the night, I kept reflecting on the past 14 months and trying to decide whether they were really as nice as I thought them to be. I kept trying to weigh what they did and how they did to judge whether they loved me or how much they loved me.

After a lot of thought, I decided that maybe I should give them some benefit of doubt. After all, they were my parents. Maybe this school isnt such a bad idea. With this chain of thought, my mind finally wandered itself into dreamy-land.

I was woken up early the next morning, at 7 am. We went through a morning chores quickly and I was ready by 845 am to leave for school. Papa had gone to work a little before as he had some meeting. Dadi, Chhota Dada, Bhua, Mansi Di and Gunjan Di were all there to say ta-ta to me as I embarked on a new project. My dependable Mummy was going with me to the school.

On the way to school, I had a nice big yellow banana. Having had milk before, my tummy was full. As a result, there was no space for any pangs of anxiety in there :)

School was basically inside this big house which someone had. Mummy and Me walked into this big classroom. It had a nice big jungle painted on one wall, with all animals and trees and grass. The other walls had some pictures of some animals or something or the other.

There was some 7-8 other kids who came in in due course, each with their Mummys and one with his Papa. Then there were three teachers - Kavita Teacher, Bina Teacher and Aashika Teacher. There was also one Malati Aunty who was going to play some music and Sudhir Kaka who was to play the tabla and drums.

School started at 920 am with a recitation of Om and then Ganesh Vandana. Mummy told me that Ganesh Ji is a very important jai-jai. So I kept my hands folded and sat there.

Then they gave us out name cards. Each of the baby's names were written on a white board. They took so much time to give out mine. I kept pulling each baby's card as I was sure they had given mine to someone else by mistake. Mummy kept trying to hold me back. I was quite upset. I mean, why did she not want me to get my own name card??

Finally, the teacher gave me my name card. I looked at it and I was very happy :)

Then we sang Good Morning to Mr. Sun, Lady Moon, all teachers, all babies and all parents. It was a lot of fun. We sang Sa-Re-Ga-Ma-Pa-Dha-Ni-Sa in some Raag Bhairavi. I could not even pronounce it. I had to tell Mummy to tell it to Papa so he could write it down.

We sang a few other nursery rhymes - the monkey rhyme and the teddy bear rhyme. Let me tell you the monkey rhyme.

"Five little monkeys, jumping on the bed,
One fell down and broke his head.
What did the monkey say - Ouch!!
What did the monkey say - Ouch!!
Mumma called the doctor,
The doctor said,
No more monkeys jumping on the bed."

Then there were four monkeys, then three monkeys, two monkeys, one monkey and then no more monkeys jumping on the bed.

We came home and did this for Papa also. He totally enjoyed it.

After this we had a free play time. There were different games in the four corners of the room. Some of them were likel the games I have at home. I would start enjoying one game by which time Mummy would want to take me to the other. I did not like that. So I started throwing tantrums to tell her to stop. I mean, can you stop a game in the middle without finishing it? You tell me!!

Finally we played passing the parcel, then had an aarti where they put tikka for each of us. We ended with another prayer, this time in Marathi. We ended the day with another chanting of Om.

I slept off on the way home. I was so tired after all the fun. I had never imagined that school was going to be so awesome. I felt very bad for thinking ill of Mummy-Papa.

I am now totally looking forward to the next class.