It was all rather quiet when I reached my faculty on the fourth floor on Teacher's day on the fifth of September though there was indeed quite a good deal of student movement. I usually reach early so as to cover up on leftover work. However, the moment I stepped into my faculty, I realized that something was different. Lying on each teacher's work station was a folded A-3 sized folder. When you opened the folder, the inner pages were full of greeting from students. The front page of mine had a very nice picture of me!
The glasses, the side-parting of the hair, the mustache, and the way the laces have been tied, someone had seriously studied how I looked and this was a testimony to the impact teachers leave on their students' minds!
The day went on we went into our classes the students were a little restless-they had bags which I assumed contained their spare clothes. I had an inkling that the grade twelve students had planned something for later on, but then I did not pay heed, I had to wind up with ASL marks, Report Bee entries, and all this while the grade eight students poured into the faculty with their appreciation cards that they had made, cut designed, and written with their honest and sincere feelings. We were all overwhelmed by their gratitude expressed not through expensive designer cards, or even fancy knick knacks, but with colorful bits of paper with a sincere message in the inner fold.
After dispersal, we had to head to one of the auditoriums and as soon as each teacher reached the entrance there was a loud cheer to welcome the teacher. The cheering was so loud that I had to close my ears for some time, although it did nothing to dampen the spirit and the enthusiasm.
We took our seats waiting for the program to start, and lo and behold got to see my grade twelve students on the stage, handling the announcements and the commentaries all in very different avatars, it was like they had suddenly become grown ups with the ability to take responsibilities a confidence that I saw sometimes in the class.
But then, well it was a double whammy for us this year. While the students got to honor their teachers on the fifth of September, the core group with Manit Sir appreciated all the teachers on the eighth of September. Teachers and staff who had completed five years and more were given a special mention and tokens of thanks were given to them, I included! The appreciation and words of encouragement were so straight from Manit Sir's heart that most of us were spellbound and had no words to say! After muster in the main auditorium, we proceeded to The Kingdom of Dreams for the "Beyond Bollywood" show. It was indeed a wonderful moment for the teachers for once to relax, put their corrections away and soak in the music and performance of the exceptionally talented artists on stage.
Heartfelt thanks to all the students and the Core Group for making this a memorable and wonderful Teacher's Day!
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