REBELS.

Adolescence is a chaotic phase of life.

Tantrums and mood swings and cheek and rebellion is, in my opinion far from being called cute . Neither party is happy. Teens are unhappy about almost everything and parents are unhappy because of the teens, period.

Mrs. Bhan’s departure was a time of supreme turmoil for us. We were angry and sad and confused and scared. This was a massive adjustment to make in our carefree young lives and we could not absorb it at all. “We” being- the girls!

On a slightly different topic-

Males’ way of bonding or “Bromance” as it is nowdays called, simply fascinates me. Think about it..

They may call each other all sorts of filthy,offensive swear names in the world but how they manage to not take it personally I cannot imagine. They hardly fight:  simply because they hardly talk in such detail.They’d rather play PsP for hours!  If they are unhappy, they let out their steam by packing a punch and are pally the next hour. Discussion is not a regular term in their dictionary.

The beauty of it is that how completely oblivious they are of their friendship. No “Best buds” or “ Friends forever” or “Awesome foursome” for the boys. For them, it’s merely having fun with the people you hang out with on daily basis. If they are happy, they don’t gush. If they are sad, they grimace…and then they move on in both the cases respectively. I am not advocating their way of bonding and let me assure you, I love the companionship I have with my girlfriends.. but let’s admit it, in some cases this sort of approach may help things a great deal.

Talking about us women ….we are a bit different than that, and if we speak about the teenage girls??  KA-BOOOOOM!

Me and my gal-pals went on for hours over the phone droning about the new Pride. We were convinced that it would be sheer disloyalty towards Mrs. Bhan to even consider accepting the new person in her place. My mom made me hang up the phone and lectured about accepting the changes that come in life with good grace. I sulked till dinnertime.

“Look!” Venky said to me , next day in the bus“ Even I am sad that Mrs. Bhan left but didn’t she say that her grandchildren need her. She wants to be with her family, what’s wrong with that? Makes sense, doesn’t it?”

“Puuuuhleeeeeeeease”  I retorted with narrowed eyes “One- you don’t look sad at all and twoooo- You are so naive. Don’t you know that she said that to us because  she had to tell us something atleast . She doesn’t mean it! There must be some other reason I am sure which she was unable to share with us. Think about it!”

“You watch too much soap operas on tv, is what I think!” he muttered.

As we crossed Mrs. Bhan’s office, we saw Mrs. Ghosh hurrieng down the banister  struggling with a heavy carton in her hands. She stopped every few steps to adjust her pretty jade green sari pallu over her shoulder.

 I ran towards her and immediately blurted out fearfully “ Are u leaving too?”

She blinked and then smiled gently “ No silly!’ she said “ I am just taking my things to.. ah, “ she hesitated “ Mrs. Bhan’s office. I have been made the vice-principal of the school.

I let out a breath of relief and after congratulating her,proceeded towards my class as Venky stopped to help Mrs Ghosh with her things.

Sakshi, Pratishtha and Khushboo were sitting at the front desk somberly whereas Avtar, Aniket and Amitayu were playing ball with balled up hankerchiefs as usual.

“ You guys are so heartless!” I snapped “ Don’t have feelings at all!”

“ Shut uuuuup!” Avtar said lazily “ What do you want us to do. It’s happened, get over it. There must be a good reason why Mrs Bhan had to leave. We will write to her and meet her again soon but please just get normal, you girls.”

Without answering I went over to the girls and were soon joined by Sonal who looked grim as well.

Mrs Ghosh came over for the attendance and she looked a bit flushed as it was her first day as a VP. We did not know if we were curious to go to the assembly or dreading it but soon we found ourselves standing outside in the verandah for the assembly, looking at our new head-master.

He had a pretty striking personality, that we couldn’t deny. He was in mid fifties and was easily over six feet in height. He had peppered wavy hair,light eyes and a  breezy smile . He was dressed impeccably in a crist navy blue blazer over a white shirt and khaki pants and beamed at all of us as he came forward to address the assembly for the first time after the hymn.

“ Helloooo!” he said “ My name is Mr. Arun K. Verma and as you may have guessed, I am your new headmaster..”

The teachers smiled encouragingly at their respective classes but the students just stared apprehensively at this newcomer, silently checking him out.

“ I know it is overwhelming for everybody that your headmistress had to leave on such short notice and I am sure you are missing her a lot”  he continued “ but I am sure that you and I would be able to be become good friends very very soon as well.There are going to be some tiny changes in the school schedule and the way things would be run but over all Pride would be the same joyful place that it has always been and which has been loved by all of you all these years. ”

Mrs Ghosh stepped forward and said “ Let us all give him a round of applause children.”

There was some lazy clapping.

“ He has an impressive background record”  Sakshi said as we filed out of the foryer towards our class “Mrs David was telling that to one of the teachers .”

“Whatever!” Pratishtha said,shrugging .

The new day began and ironically my first class of the day was English Literature with Khushboo.

“ Who do you think would be taking our class?” Khushboo inquired.

“Dunno!” I said, as we proceeded towards the library where Mrs. Ghosh had told us to go (we used to have our class in Mrs. Bhan’s office when she used to take them)  “but whoever it is, it’s gonna be pretty tough to fill Mrs. Bhan’s shoes.”

The library was empty except for Mr. Rajesh and Ms Payal, a cheerful young teacher in her early twenties who taught junior classes. I grinned at Mr. Rajesh and he narrowed his eyes at me in warning to behave.

“It’s so much fun to mess with him” I chortled.

As we began to take our seats to wait for the new teacher, Ms Payal looked up and smiling,waved at us.

“Yoohoo! Khushboo and mallika!” she called out “Over here.”

Raising our eyes at each other, we made our way towards her. Really? Ms payal? She was a junior teacher. English literature was my favourite subject and my heart sank as I thought of the fun lessons we had with Mrs Bhan.

“Goodmorning!” she said with a broad smile “ I will be taking your literature classes and I thought today, you guys should just get me acquainted with your syllabus and the method by which Mrs. Bhan taught you during her lesson.”

“Okay!” we said quietly.

We spent the next half hour explaining how much syllabus we had covered and how we read each lesson aloud while underlining the difficult words as we came across them. We looked them up in the library or at home and discussed the meanings with Mrs. Bhan  during the next lesson. Also, how Mrs. Bhan used to explain each chapter in detail to us and then gave us different assignments be it research, essay writing or the character-sketches based on the contents of the chapter.

Ms payal was pleasant and friendly. She had attended a few of our English lessons in the past with Mrs Bhan and Mrs Ghosh but we had never interacted much with her. Today we had a good time with her and it wasn’t as difficult to face as much I had imagined it would be. She went over our earlier assignments and marvelled at how advanced the level of assignments was. We were covering three books simuntaneously- The Heavens’ lake by Vikram seth, Tess of the Durbevilles by Thomas Hardy and The Tale of two cities by Charles Dickens. Ms Payal decided to take up Tess of the Durbevilles first and we were to read the next chapter once by ourselves before our next class.

“ She’s nice!” Khushboo said, as we made our way to the class. I could not disagree to that and kept quiet.

The rest of the day passed of at the regular pace. Maybe we had envisioned that the  school would seem drastically different now that Mrs bhan wasn’t here but that was not the case. Even though, there was not one moment when we didn’t remember Mrs Bhan that first day, it was not as horrid  as we had thought. It felt almost the same.

Sonal, Sakshi, Prati and I had double lessons with Mrs David after the recess and she could not be cajoled into giving one as free.

“Pleeease ma’am!” we chorused.

“NO!” she cried “ This is your Board year and it’s my responsibility that your syllabus gets completed in time. We have lots to cover and I am not going to give away whole periods away any more. Last fifteen minutes maybe if you girls behave.”

Giving up on the hope, we opened our Commerce notebooks and Mrs. David began reciting notes for us to write. By the end of the second lesson, we were mentally exhausted (and sleepy!) of all the complex profit-making knowledge.

We then had a class with Mrs Ghosh and with Mrs Bandi each and we knew better than to ask them both for a free period. We hated Monday for the obvious reasons but moreso this year, as the timetable consisted of all the heavy subjects in one day.

Lunch time was a relief and after bidding goodbye to Mrs Bandi (she was a visiting faculty) the four of us headed towards the lunch room.

“Hope there’s something good for lunch today!” Sakshi commented, stiffling a yawn.

“Maybe Rajma or Idli-sambhar!” I said.

We reached our table and joined the boys who had arrived before us. We flopped down on the bench and I heard Pratishtha groan just as I spotted the infamous “pizzas” in the bowl.

“No no no noooo!” she moaned.

“Doesn’t it always happen?” Sonal cried “ whenever we are hoping or looking forward to something good happening, complete opposite happens!”

“ I am damn hungry today but I don’t want to eat this!” I said, annoyed.

“You know” Sakshi whispered “let us not!”

We decided to not eat a morsel of the pizza and sat with our hands folded and our plates clean as the lunch hall around us buzzed of happy voices and clattering utensils.

“What are you all upto now?”Amitayu inquired as Avtar cheerfully gobbled pizzas after pizzas. 

They were thick uneven bases covered with cabbages and capsicum and peas.We turned our faces everytime the bowls passed across us. These pizzas were probably the only item we disliked at our school. Rest of the dishes were always delicious.

“Hunger strike?” Aniket snorted “ As if anybody is going to care.”

Eventually the whole lunch hall emptied around us till the four of us were the only ones left at the table. Khushboo had eaten with her psychology teacher at her table whilst discussing something about their upcoming lesson.

“What’s the matter?” Captain Shekhawat strode over to us.

“We want something else to eat and we won’t leave until you give us something sir.” Pratishtha said fearlessly.

“Why didn’t you have your lunch.” He asked.

“ We don’t like ..uh..pizzas” I said, my head bowed so that I won't have to look at his face.

“We want something else!” Sonal repeated.

Without saying a word Captain Shekhawat strode out of the lunch hall leaving a bunch of puzzled didis hovering around us like bees.

He returned a some time later with Mrs. Ghosh who bustled over to us with a wary expression on her face.

“ GIRLS!” she demanded “ Whats going on? Stop this childhish tantrum right now and go to your class.

“Ma’am, we are really hungry” I said “ We want something good to eat otherwise we are not budging.”

“See girls” she said weakly “I know you all are feeling overwhelmed ever since Mrs Bhan left but this sort of behavior is just not accepted. You are the seniormost students. Everybody had the same food and you are the only ones complaining. That’s not right.Now,come on get up this instant!”

We did not move an inch until we heard a pleasant voice behind us.

“What’s going on here?”

We turned and saw our new headmaster stroding towards us . Obviously, Captain Shekhawat had told about this unwelcome incident in his lunch room to him as well.

To our horror, he sat down at the bench along with us and smiled as if we all were here for a game of poker.

“Captain Shekhwat” he said to the head-cook “ Even I haven’t had my lunch yet. Could you please give me a plate and we could all have lunch together. I hope Mrs. Ghosh wouldn’t mind telling the concerned teacher that the girls would be a tad bit late for the lesson.”

“It’s Ok sir!” Mrs ghosh replied, her lip twitching “I thinking it is their free period.”

Suppressing a laugh, she went out of the lunch room just as didi put a plate in front of Mr. Verma and served us all pizzas.

He was sitting right besides me and I was literally shivering a little. We all avoided each others’ eyes and shoved food in our mouths as quickly as possible, all stubborness forgotten. When Pratishtha coughed due to eating too fast, Mr. Verma silently handed her a glass of water. It was turning out to be the longest half an hour of our lives.

“There!” he said cheerfully, wiping the corner of his mouth with his tissue “I think we are all done. What a lovely lunch it was, isnt it girls? Thank Captain Shekhawat please.”

We all mumbled thankyou to Cpt. Shekhawat who faintly scowled at us in return but accepted the thanks nevertheless.

“Now run along! See you tomorrow.”

We hurried and ran out lest we end up walking out the lunchroom with Mr. Verma. and didn’t stop till we reached the class.

“Whose stupid idea was that?” I snarled as we banged opened the door and stormed inside.

The boys who had a free period as well broke into the heaps of laughter when they saw us. Khushboo had a psychology class and was blissfully unaware of our fiasco.

“How was the lunch date?” Avtar asked grinning and ducked as Sonal threw the duster at him “Mrs Ghosh told us you are dining with Mr. Verma. What did you have? Caviar?”

“It was sooo embarassing!” Pratishtha hissed.

“I was so afraid!” Sakshi said, wincing a little.

“He sat right besides me!” I said “I could hardly open my mouth. God knows how I managed to eat .”

“Who had told u to act oversmart,huh? Serves you right!” Venky said, rocking his chair and juggling three pieces of chalk.

Ignoring him, we settled into our seats and busied ourselves in some or the other work.I am sure all four of us were thinking the exact same thing. How foolish we had been! We would never attempt anything of this sort again. Eventhough he had been nothing more than pleasant with us, we knew that Mr. Verma was the last person you would ever want to get on the bad side of.

First Heart-break.

It was a chilly morning. Venky and I got off from the school bus and slowly walked towards the foyer. The change in environment was startling. The gloomy air seemed almost tangible. I automatically glanced at Mrs. Bhan’s office and my heart lurched to see it empty. Her desk, laden with papers and many artifacts, the colorful calender and the momentos given by children, was gone. Rest of the furniture and beautiful paintings were gone, and most of all, the smiling face behind the desk was gone. Mrs. Bhan’s fragrance was gone and so was her warmth and love and motherly presence. Mrs. Bhan had left Pride Education!

Last month, on the day we had finished with the last paper of our half-yearly exams, we had all been ecstatic and were deep into deciding the venue of celebration, when we were puzzled to see a couple of junior teachers exiting from Mrs. Bhan’s office, wiping their eyes. As the day went by, we sensed that there was something going on around us. The air was dismal and the teachers’ hearts just didn’t seem to be in teaching that day. All around us, young students were delighted that they had got a surprise free period or how a particular teacher had not been in a mood to teach and so, gave them the permission to complete their other work.

 We  i.e Sakshi, Sonal, Pratishtha and I, caught Gopal bhaiya just as he was proceeding towards the foyer to ring the last bell of the day. Was it my imagination or even Gopal bhaiya seemed somber and depressed?

“What’s going on Gopal Bhaiya?” I asked as we crossed him on the way.

“Aapko nahin pata? (You don’t know?)”, he didn’t ask us what we were referring to but straightaway gave us the information which shattered the hearts of carefree sixteen year olds, “Mrs. Bhan is leaving the school.”

This time we did not laugh or joke or roll our eyes because looking around the silent corridoors, it somehow fit! There was too much seriousness and desolation in Gopal bhaiya’s words for them to be a joke.  We knew that it must be true! As he went on his way with his head bowed, we were at complete loss for words. The four of us just stood there staring blankly at each other. Everybody who was a part of Pride Education during our time can vouch that this was one thing which was just beyond belief. The idea of our school without Mrs. Bhan was inconceivable!

“It can’t be.” Pratishtha finally whispered.

None of us answered as we were all inwardly battling with our own baffled emotions. We slowly made our way back to our class to collect our things and informed Khushbu and the boys. As predicted, they laughed the idea off and assured us that it was a rumor but we could not make ourselves believe that. Hadn’t we heard the same thing from Mrs. Bandi a few days back? 

There was no after-exam celebration after school. We all returned home to mull over the worrieng information and however hard I tried, I couldn’t envision Pride without Mrs. Bhan. The moment I entered the house, I bombarded my mom with questions as ,her being a teacher at Pride, I had thought that she might have some idea about the matter. But she was clueless and had just heard the buzz around the school just as we had. She assured me that if there was some truth in this information, Mrs. Bhan would announce it herself in the teachers’ meeting which was to take place the following day at Dhar Kothi.

I called my friends and told them that we would probably know the truth the next day. I remember how hard we prayed and hoped that by this time the following day, we would be happy and relaxed and laughing at how worried we had got over an untrue piece of gossip!

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We didn’t have to wait for my mom to tell me anything about the “rumor” because Mrs. Bhan announced the shocking news herself in the assembly the following day. Right after we had sung the grace and the younger chilren had read bits of the national and international  news, Mrs. Bhan stepped forward to make announcements as usual. Today  however, she took a moment to let her eyes wander over the assembled students, took a deep breath and started speaking.

“Children, today I have to make a very important announcement in front of u all.” She said, “ It is very difficult for me to say these words and I am sure it would come as bit of a shock for all of you too…”

Around us, some teachers including Mrs. Ghosh had already started sniffing into their hankerchiefs. A shiver ran down my spine. Mrs. Bhan’s warm smile was missing from her lips and she continued gravely-

“…After this month ends, I would no longer be your head-mistress. Your school would have a new head-master and I will move abroad to USA , where I would be nearer to my family and to my grand-children. I am sure that you all would agree that they need my presence as much as you all do, isn’t it? So I hope all of you will understand and welcome the new principal in my place with due respect and enthusiasm.” she said, smiling lovingly at the front row which consisted of the youngest students  i.e  the fourth graders.

Her words were followed by a stunned silence. You could have heard the pin drop! And then, everybody started speaking at once. Students protesting hysterically,  some crying already, teachers unsuccessfully trying to calm their respective classes. When Mrs. Bhan kept her finger on her lips, as per the rule she waited for the anguished students to settle down but  none of the normal rules seem to apply today. Students were far from becoming quiet and continued to shout and speak all at once. As for me, I just stared and stared at Mrs. Bhan, unable to comprehend her words. I wanted her to shout at any moment “See I fooled you all!” or “I was joking! I can never leave !” but looking at the sadness in her eyes as she looked at the disheartened children, I knew those words would never come.

Finally, Mrs. Bhan took the mike in her hand and ordered the children to move back to their classes. Teachers , some strictly, some beseechly, guided their respective students to the classes. Mrs. Ghosh, still wiping her eyes, simply started moving towards the building and we followed her wordlessly.

Moments with Mrs. Bhan flashed in front of my eyes….

 The first time I had met her when she had taken my entrance interview at Dhar kothi.

The first time I had shyly gifted her a hand-made card on her b’day and she had hugged me, making me blush.

When she had walked in at Mrs. David’s grand-daughters christening , a small gathering at latter’s home where my family had also been invited and my jaw had dropped open on seeing my head-mistress outside the school’s premises. Looking at my nervousness, she had laughingly said,  “Hello Mallika, you are terrified to see me, aren’t you?”.  

When Khushboo, Mrs. Bhan and I had read Vikram Seth’s silly, unrhyming poem in which he compares a woman to a cow and Mrs. Bhan had muttered –“ I just don’t understand what he writes sometimes!” and all three of us had laughed and laughed.

When I had shown her a poem I had written for Mrs. Mulani’s English assignment and she had encouraged me to continue writing.

A single tear rolled down my cheek as I closed my eyes shut and I slowly wiped it away before anybody else noticed. We all entered the class and walked to our seats as if in a trance. For once, even the boys seemed speechless and sat with their heads bowed. Mrs. Ghosh sat heavily on her chair and finally Sonal asked in a whisper – “Did you know, Mrs. Ghosh?”

“We came to know about it yesterday in the meeting.” She said in a tiny voice, “ We knew it would have this effect on the students. Pride without Mrs. Bhan…” she shook her head and closed her eyes. She had not completed this sentence but we all understood. It was unimaginable! Simply unimaginable!

The days which followed next were the most difficult ones during our time at Pride. We wept and moped for two whole days after Mrs. Bhan’s announcement and after this initial shock, the whole school went into a silent stupor. There was no laughter or jokes or teasing, only teachers struggling to again engage students in the studies and the students harassing themselves with the discussions about Mrs. Bhan’s departure. One thing which we can very well realize now and could not at that time is that how difficult it must have been for Mrs. Bhan to maintain her composure at that time. To see such despair amongst the students and every single person crying and requesting her to stay.  It went on for days! How much control it must have cost that person who used to get emotional on seeing trivial things around her….

Once Sakshi and Venky had gotten into an argument and they had ended up destroying some of the class’s furniture. And Mrs. Bhan had cried! Our headmistress had gotten emotional  thinking that how could we not be a little considerate so as to take care of the things which we used.

Once she had cried when a special girl, whose eye-sight was a bit poor, had danced along with her class for the Independence day celebration.

She used to cry when we misbehaved, she used to cry when we told her that we love her. I remember getting amused as a little girl and wondering “Why Mrs. Bhan cries so much?” but today I get awed on thinking that how Mrs. Bhan must have held her own when everybody around her was hysterical about her departure.

We thought of approaching Dr. Bhan and asking about their sudden departure from school but everytime we saw him, looking grim, we lost our nerve.

Pride continued to grieve till finally the woeful day of Dr. and Mrs. Bhan’s departure from Indore arrived. We all went to her home to see them off and weren’t surprised to see the house swarming with other students and teachers. the luggage was being adjusted in the cab by the driver and Dr. Bhan was talking on the phone near the front door.

We made our way to where Mrs. Bhan stood. There were numerous people surrounding her. We could hardly speak to her and so, after greeting her and presenting her with the flowers we had brought, we waited out in the garden, each of us engrossed in our own thoughts. Pratishtha lost her control first as she had been associated with Mrs. Bhan the longest- since third grade, and then, none could stop our tears. 

We stood there wiping our eyes again and again till Dr. Bhan and Mrs. Bhan stepped out of the house, ready to leave. As everybody started to hug both of them goodbye, Mrs. Bhan finally lost her control and succumbed to tears.

We all cried hard as each of us hugged them for the last time before they sat in the cab. As it started moving , the crowd of students and teachers waved and cried out farewells till it rounded off at the corner and finally went out of sight. There were a few moments of  sorrowful silence after which the large group began to disperse.

It was tormenting to think that we would never see her Silver Ford Ikon enter the gates of the school again, that she would not be present there every morning to greet us before the classes start, that we would never read our lessons with her and underline the difficult words to tell her their meaning the following day and would never get a whiff of her perfume as she passed us at the assembly , her hands folded behind her back .

Her teachings continue to be rooted deep within us and our love for her glows inside us as strongly as ever with each passing day.

We returned home with our hearts heavy with a feeling of emptiness , not quite ready to face a new Pride the following day.