That was a winter evening, of the month of January, and except the odd man in me, all the bachelor professors, in one of the rooms of their 'den' had been enjoying the steaming cups of tea along with puffed rice and snacks while listening to the discourse of Tewari Da. Each one of us was wrapped in woolen wrappers. This was one of those yearly week long holiday visits of mine to Agartala, Tripura. Most of the time of my seven holidays were earmarked for ceaseless adda at some place or the other.
Let me come back to the discourse of Tewari Da. He had been telling about one of the predicaments of his school days. He always had to stand up on the bench or to stand outside the class as a punishment whenever he had to spell certain words in the English Literature Class. He could not understand why the 'pronunciation' and 'spelling' will not match with each other....why in certain cases some letters will take a French leave to put him into trouble. So he had to 'invent' his own solution. He had decided that he would pronounce those words in the class, as they should be, but in his mind, he would memorize the spelling and its pronunciation without allowing any letter to slip away. Of-course he had to keep this system strictly to himself.
The book I was leafing through has been presented to my wife by her sister, Radha, who was yet to cross the barrier of school but was much ahead of her age and time. The book gifted was " The Psychological Developement Of Children".
It was a small, decent, book with no complicated medical terms or jargon, no preaching of theories. It simply grouped children, each group of a span of three years, from infancy to the door of teens and then narrated in simple language, how boys and girls of a particular age group will behave and how parents should respond to their acts and behaviors. At the preface, there was a stern warning from the author to the parents, that no kid should be given any "Corporal Punishment" for any of their mischievous acts until and unless that very act may endanger his or her life. Another important guidance for the parents was that the most severe punishment which can be meted out to a kid is to stop talking to him or her. But this should not continue for more than twenty minutes as otherwise it will be too severe for them. This dictum was for the first group of kids, i.e the infants.
While having the lunch we have decided to give a trial of one or two of the dictum given in the book,on our child, in the evening. The book preached that to get a small kid attracted and understand something to which otherwise he or she is not interested, the best way for the parents is to ignore the child and one should act to teach the subject in question to the other. Finding it to be something very funny, we chose the letter 'V,'accompanied with a picture of a violin from one of his books and I started teaching my wife...'this is V for violin', as the boy always used to find some difficulty in identifying this alphabet. While continuing this act of teaching, we kept an eye on the kid. Soon he came over to us and kept looking at our faces and then, as he was not invited, he, on his own, started taking initiative and kept chanting V for violin, while putting one of his little thumbs on the letter 'v'and the picture of violin. We continued ignoring him for some more time but he did not stop and went along with his act of imitating his father. After sometime, just to see,how far it worked, we mixed blocks of all the alphabets and asked him to find out "V" from the cluster.He made no-mistake to pick up the plastic block embossed with the letter 'v' accompanied with a picture of violin.Since then The Book be came "Bible"to us in rearing our child. Days went by and the kid celebrated his third 'Happy Birth Day'.Time had come for him to go to school.We chose the best school in that area..The Modern School.The ambiance of the school was excellent,the flowering trees, the trees loaded with fruits,the chirp ping birds and playful Hares, swings, see-saws...all at one place,in the same compound.The Gray Haired,Cambridge Educated,Strict Disciplinarian but Kind hearted,Widow of a valiant Fighter Plane Pilot was the Principal of the Convent. One day, the mother and the son went to the school and after an 'interview' and other formalities, the kid got admitted to the school We went to our "Bible" to know how the kid was likely to behave on his first day at the school and as well, how the parents should respond.The Book clearly stated that on the "First Day to School",every kid will enjoy the outing .They will feel a sense of 'Freedom' from the Governance of their parents and the confines of their homes.This will last for two days and from third day onwards, they will be reluctant to go to school as their illusion will be vanished since by that time they will spot that they have entered into some other kind of confinements.So from third day, they will have to be coaxed with love, tenderness along with a little sternness.This stage will continue for few more days and after that every thing will be normal. Thus we came to know the secret.Then came one of the most significant and meaningful day of his life...his first day to the school...the first step to the outer world.The mother and the son boarded the car and went for the school and ,after being a witness of this land-mark event in the life of the kid,I went for my work.During my break-fast hour I came to the quarters,more anxious to
Thus muttering P--sychology, Neigh--bour and the likes, while trudging through the muddy terrains, he started going to the school, a few miles away from his home in an obscure village of Bihar. But his invention worked and since then he never had to endure any punishment for spelling 'psychology' as he remembered it in his mind as P-sychology. I don't know the present whereabouts of Dr.R.N.Tewari M.Sc,Phd. as I have lost any touch with him since 1975, but the memory of his ingenious method stayed with me.
On one day, after many years when I returned from my work to my quarters for lunch I found a small book lying on the table. As I was leafing through the book, I resorted to roaring laughter. My wife and the kid rushed to me, from another room, and kept looking at me in astonishment. The kid, who had just crossed two years of age perhaps thought Papa must have found something very amusing and kept eagerly smiling at me as he knew that soon it will be shared with him and as for my wife,she was unsure whether I was in the right frame of mind. This was quite natural for her, I presume, as she was not aware of the hilarious story of P--sychology and Tewari Da.
So far as the first warning is concerned, I stuck to it religiously although the kid had some spanking from his mother for writing 'doctor' as 'boctor' or 'Calcutta' as' ')alcutta'. But so far as the second guidance is concerned, I tried once but that was more painful to me than to the kid. These things came afterward but first thing should come first.
The kid was very pleased to see the "Assets" of the school and as well so many boys and girls of his age.
know about the happenings in the school then the break-fast.I found the empty table with nothing on it to eat.I searched for my wife and found her sitting on a couch in one of the rooms,morose and on the verge of tears.Without disturbing her,I made the 'break fast' and coaxed her to come to the table to have a bite.Gradually the cause of her sorrow started unfolding.With a heavy voice she told that as soon as the kid had been asked by his 'Miss'to accompany her,he started following her without giving a second glance to his mother.I consoled her and told her that all these were written in 'The Bible'.She told that why this had to be so ruthlessly true?He could atleast give a glance or smile while parting?I kept silent for some time.Then I told her that this just the beginning.He is on his way to the outer world and from now on he will move further and further.But that should not be of any concern or worry for you.The 'invisible' umbilical chord will keep him tied with you all the while,he will continue to rotate around you whatever might his distance from you like the celestial bodies around The Sun or the electrons around nucleus.While giving her the analogy,I also told her that only in certain cases,as in transitional elements,the electrons changes the orbit and the colour of the element also changes.For the time being let us think about the Solar system and of the 'stable' elements and let us forget about the 'Rare Earths',the 'Transitional and Inner Transitional' elements.Perhaps she believed me,about the humane elements without bothering to know any thing about the Chemistry or science.
Now when that invisible chord has extended for a formidable length of 20000K.M and still remained equally strong as when the kid was only a few feet away from her I wonder whether she still remembers the conversation at the 'Break-Fast' table.Perhaps the answer is manifested in her attitude while testing the bondage through the electronic medium.
No comments:
Post a Comment