One Xth year!

The beginning of Xth, for me, was the starting of Sreelatha miss's tuition classes. Me, Salini and Soumya used to go by cycle. I was the better of the three regarding punctuality(thammil bhedam thomman, of course!). I used to reach Soumya's house on time, and then wait for her to come out (for about half an hour-mind you), talk with her sisters, peep into the well, complete my assignments and stuff. Soumya was always late. Sometimes she wouldn't have even dressed when I reached her house. After a hurried makeup, she'll hop out and we'll pedal to Salini's house and thank God, she was usually on time. But later we split up, and me and Soumya would go by the 'Pala way' and Salini will come alone, by the 'Mannathikkulam way.' But even this didn't go on for long. Soon Soumya started walking to tuition and I stayed by cycle; so we sort of drifted apart.

I liked Sreeletha miss as soon as I saw her. She had a nice way of behaving with students. Since her son, Vishnu, was in our class, she had no trouble understanding our problems. She introduced me to Aggarwal texts and star-marked theorems and sample papers. She made Maths easy for us. Now after two years I've forgotten the tuition timings but I have a vague recollection that it was in the afternoon.

Regarding our school life, I must of course start with the disastrous shuffling attempt. As I've mentioned before, it left Ragi in tears. But the decision was revoked soon, because, the teachers felt that Xth was too big a year academically, to put emotional stress on us.

I don't remember much about the classes. But I remember Anurag sir's Chemistry periods. He had a curious way of moving his neck when asking questions; it was very funny. (I learned later that Sreelakshmi of the other class was paired up with him in a rumor, a sir, imagine!!)We thought we were really unlucky to have got him, because he asked questions everyday but they helped us a great to get through our exams in the end. I remember writing down all the organic chemistry equations(some 15 or so) 3 times everyday, to by heart them. I instructed my sister (then in 12th) to do the same and she showed me her organic chemistry equations-an entire textbook! That shut me up.

Our Maths teacher was Girijamani miss and she was totally against tuition. So we were targeted during her periods. I remember once, Aswin was doing something and miss caught him and asked him to say what is the meaning of 'linear equations'. It was then that I learned that Linear equations were named so because they gave a Linear-straight line-graph when plotted on 2D.

Sreelatha miss took us Malayalam. Those classes were conducted in X A. They were pretty much like our 9th standard. I still remeber P. Kunjiraman Nair's Pushpagopuram:
njan pokunnu.
njan kaathirikkum. anthimegham paranju.

and then,

bhoomi udhayam kaathirunnu, marangal pookkaalam kaathirunnu, aambalpoo maniyarayil paathiraakaatinte padhanyaasam kaathirunnu.

Then there was that 'Chelikundile thamaraye thazuki, pularoli paadi: Omane, njan varunnu.' Later Aparna wrote in my autograph: Chelikundile thavalaye thazhuki bella paadi: 'Makale njan varunnu'

I really miss my Malayalam text- they at least had no derivations or problems.

English periods were shared by MenonGirija miss and Shobha miss. About Literature, I remember everything- starting from The Tribute and 'the moribund of relationships'!! Then Cutie Pie! (We put that nickname for a senior chettan too, because he had big eyes. He played the girl's role in Boy's Group dance the following year.) Most of all, I remember the Golden guide( ONE BIG NIGHTMARE)! Ho, I remember all the poems- The Frog and the Nightingale, The Palanquin, The Night of the Scorpion, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner!!! Everything! I remember Gayathri chechi teaching The Christmas Carol on Teacher's Day. Then Julius Ceaser and me teaching Ragi inside the auditorium on Sports Day. Speaking of Julius Ceaser, I must mention the 11th boy's skit about Ceaser the previous year. I'm sure everyone remembers Karan and Rahul on stage and Shana miss laughing her head out. There was also Sachin's Malayalam skit and Sreelakshmi's Nagavalli- we died laughing that day.
About the Reader text, I remember that 'Itinerary' and Skander.

Well, I shouldn't skip the Biology classes with Marina miss. Though, of course, I'm impressed by the way she plunged through our 'Reproduction' chapter, keeping her face free of all emotions, she did irritate me at times. In the first term itself me and Aswin and our mothers, got separate firings from her, on an Open house day (because of our rumor, of course.) I felt really bad that day, I mean, she had no right to scold me in front of my mother.

Our class teacher was Rekha miss and we became very close to her, though, honestly, nobody cared much about her teaching skills. (Have you noticed that she repeats everything she says.)

Then we had History with Chithra Miss, out of photocopied textbooks and Geography with Prasannakumari miss - One big nightmare with dictations, asking and testpapers! The X A students had Sujatha miss's economics classes, but we were not that lucky- Prasannakumari miss took Economics too for us. In Geography , me and Greeshma paired up and we fashioned all sorts of ridiculous acronyms for source states for stuff like bauxite, orange, rice, cattle and God knows what!
I'll mention a few, so you'll get an idea of it.
'Mahatma Gandhi chathu. Oru madhyam kazhichaanu jeevan nashtappettathu.' That's for bauxite.

'Aap ka roop jo kiya mujhe nuts.' For sheep.

'Roop wahi bibiji.' For goat.

'Romp up bekam' (Like in 'Ramp up remo'- it was when Anniyan was released. This one was Greeshma's creation. Rest all came from my head.) For 2/3 cattle population.

And many such stupidities!!!!!
I remember the Social project too, about Lakshmi bhai or something. And I forgot to take my project on the day of Submission and miss scolded me and I cried a lot and my mother came from my home.

So it turns out that I remember a lot of things about the classes after all.

Regarding the 'Extra-Curricular Activities', the most fresh memory is our cancelled Munnar tour. What happened is, we were to have had the tour to Munnar on a Friday, along with the rest of the school. On Thursday morning, we were all excited and Rekha miss was going on giving us all sorts of instructions regarding the dress code and stuff. Ragi'd even bought Lays for the picnic. And then, at noon, there came a dull declaration- tour for class X cancelled!! The reason- it was raining and the roads to Munnar were slippery, so no vehicles. And, the teachers, including Rekha miss, had known this from the day before, and hadn't given us a single warning! Weren't we angry! And on top of that, the yeachers put special class for the following day, when the rest of the school were going off for excursion. We complained to Sreelatha miss(Malayalam) and she looked very sorry and we felt sorry too. And poor Ragi, she'd to eat all the Lays, by herself, alone at home.

Well there we were. Our pride was wounded. I dont know what happened in the evening, anyway, the following day, Soumya sprouted a black badge as 'Dhukkhaacharanam' to special class. She had plenty of black cloth, so we all put badges. And when Rekha miss came to class, we took them out and showed to her and she laughed and we laughed. But it became a big issue to Madam- she felt that we had waved 'Karinkodi'. We protested but poor Soumya was hauled up to the office and fired and her mother was called to school and Marina miss scolded us and said we'd betrayed her. (But I owned up; I said, yes, I had pulled out the badge in the class, I said so to miss, but, naturally, I had no courage to face madam either, so, practically, Soumya was deserted.) And Aparna, she sided with teachers- she said Madam had every right to punish us; that it was indeed a criminal offense to wave 'karinkodi'. Aparna please... we were hardly 15 years old then, and there's definitely something like consideration for age under the Indian Penal Code, right??

We got our punishment all right. For a long time, it was whispered that we wouldn't have an excursion at all(I think Anu's 'aanakutty' episode somehow strengthened the belief), but we got one compensation tour in the end, as a 'shaapamoksham'- a trip to Malampuzha! It was not a great deal of excitement and neither me nor Greeshma understood why Aparna had been sniggering all the way to Malampuzha, talking about some 'Yakshi', until of course we came face-to-face with the sculpture(wide-eyed) and realized that the 'Yakshi' was worth a great deal of giggling after all.

Our farewell was in the newly built auditorium and I don't remember much about it. But of course, it was boring. There were a lot of 'itchguard suggestions' traveling around. I remember the 9th drama (and Zeba's dance) because it was ultra-boring!
Our board exams were conducted in Shantiniketan school. We usually had a lot of time to revise before exams, in the morning, not like in 12th, when we are still trying to study some derivation.

There were a lot of autograph writings too, though many of us were sure we were going to join BVB IJK, the next year too. Still who knows, right?