Sometimes.

Sometimes all you want to do is run away. Somewhere where there is no one. No human to feel any emotions other than bliss. Too much of a human contact is terrible sometimes. It just makes you more and more vulnerable. You are not you around people. You are you only when you are with yourself. I'm a people person, I can't be alone for a long time. I'm terrified of the people who don't like interaction. But sometimes I feel that is what I need. No interaction. No one to talk to. No one to hang out with. No one to expect anything from. No one to be a reason for my happiness. Because my happiness is mine after all. No one can understand my happiness nor can they understand my sorrow.

I'm a mess. People will label me a drama queen, but who are these people? People who you are running away from. People who in the end are the reason you are writing this. People who somehow inspire you to not give a fuck about them. People who are nothing but just another set of humans who are messed up in their own head, just like you are. You can write about it. Maybe they can't. They are just living with it, without uttering a word.

'I feel' because you might not feel the same

I don't understand why are things in my school not organised. Why are there not enough people to take up responsibilities given to the amount of unemployment in India. I don't understand why there isn't a proper communication mechanism in place considering that there are 4 different mediums working in the same building in 2 different slots. No I don't suffer from any OCDs. In fact I believe OCDs are over-rated.They shouldn't exist unless you are clinically diagnosed with that. Still they shouldn't exist. Okay. Point. To ask for perfection is not too much. To ask for an organised organisation isn't being sick. Its normal. Very normal. Okay, we teachers will sit for 2 hours extra every Saturday and clean our school but where is the discipline (that we claim to teach our kids and say it is essential for being given a place in the society in the category of good people) in just running the school without any chaos and disorder (I mention both chaos and disorder because I feel both when mentioned alone are lesser evil than what we teachers face in our day to day lives).

My left hand was almost about to get fractured (doctor said) because of this very chaos. I won't mention the incident as that will just ruin my beautiful writing. So you give in the rare people you have to mould your future for saving on hiring more people into an organisation or maybe I should say institution so very important. At first I felt infuriated when a parent said, 'aapko paagar milti hai kaam karneki' I literally wanted to stab her with a pencil that my 7 year olds use to write what I teach. But then I realised she is in the same boat as me (and she can push me in the sea). How can u expect a normal human being to stay calm in a overly disorganised organisation that is very important for the future generation. Anyway I also feel that I can whine better when Im high on a good book (maybe because it just got over, and I'm back to my usual life).

But again 'I feel' because you might not feel the same.

They never said it was easy!

I always wondered, what keeps people motivated to work?  Is it money, fame, recognition, ambition? How do people leave jobs that give tangible rewards and take up tasks that seems almost impossible, hopeless, and difficult? All my questions were answered instantly, when Mr. Nipun Mehta, founder of ServiceSpace said, “If you are connected to humanity, if you form a circle of love, you won’t need money, fame or recognition”. Think about it.

When after 5 weeks of training, I entered my classroom in a Government school, I was more than surprised to see good infrastructure. I had nothing to complain about with regards to the demographics of my school. But this is a very small percentage of the actual scenario. I know fellows working in dingy classrooms, no fans, no windows, 60 students sitting in a small classroom all crammed up, classrooms with tin roofs which rattle and leak during monsoons etc. All the bright, young professionals, who have left their AC offices, for some who have relocated this is a huge change. But they choose to be the part of a movement, a movement that with the utmost convictions says, ‘one day all children will attain an excellent education’.

All this is fine. All this is what we were prepared for when we committed to dedicate two years to this movement. What comes as a shock is, when we enter a grade 6 classroom and realize only 20% of the kids can speak in English and 50% of the class can understand basic instructions in English. We are here to bridge the gap. To bring our kids to their grade levels, and here we start from the scratch. Not only do we struggle with math, fluency, comprehension, writing, but we also struggle with empowering them to understand and speak in English. But we don’t give up. We promise to give our 100% and do whatever it takes to empower these kids.

What comes next is what we fellows face on a daily basis. Instructional hours: on an average, schools in India are for 5 hours. Out of which a lot of time goes by in settling, recess, morning assembly, virtual class etc. Apart from this, there are a lot of last minute changes to the time-table and our plans. Some days the craft teacher wants an hour with the kids, on the other days the Marathi teacher is rushing with her portion. There are days when the principal calls for a meeting, and on the others the school is celebrating Eid, Holi or Diwali. We are struggling every hour. We have kids from various levels in our classrooms and so it is not uncommon to take on these groups separately to help resolve the differentiation which involves extra class, differentiated plans and constant permissions from the school officials to let us use the classrooms apart from the school hours. In some cases, fellows also resort to teaching in open spaces around the schools.

What still keeps us going? One fine day, Safialam comes and fills my empty water bottle with the water that is in his water bottle. When I asked him why is he doing so? He replies, “Didi, you talk all day, you never complain when you have a sore throat, isn’t it our responsibility to take care of you like you take care of us”. We easily term these kids ‘poor’ or ‘underprivileged’ , ever wondered how do they manage to make you smile every single day with so little to give.