Straight Hate

When I was in second grade, we had a disaster in our school. It was an international school, situated in the hills of South India, in a place completely surrounded by forests (and monkeys of course). A boarding school with discipline engraved on its students’ foreheads. But, some new students had joined and through them, new vocabulary words had slowly seeped into the whole school (“like tea from a teabag”). The headmistress had a heart attack everytime someone opened his mouth, teachers screamed much more often and wooden rulers took on their second and more violent nature! What were those very offensive words? Brace yourself- ‘yea’ and ‘like.’ In a world where answers required ‘yes, madam’, these words had quite the need to be censored. And so they were.

Needless to say, the f-word, d-word, s-word and the other list of alphabetical curses were completely absent from my childhood vocabulary. I first realized this lack in fifth grade, my first full year in the United States. My teacher had made me a “Safety” and it was my duty to walk through the lines of kids waiting for the late bus and make sure everyone was good and disciplined (cough, disciple in the RedWhiteandBlue Empire was a joke).

Where crowns lose their sparkle..

So recently, I participated in this Thing (that shall not be named as I do not want this to show up in search results). It was  a multicultural pageant with girls from lots of different nations. Obviously, I represented India and there were twenty-ish other girls. Oddly enough, I was crowned. (To be more detailed, my final question was about who my role model is- Indira Gandhi all the way!)

Dreaming is a privilege

How sad it is to not have ambitions. To not dream. Children, forced to grow up, apparently done with school but with nothing else. Marriage perhaps (for girls that is), failed foreign student visa applications (to ‘greener’ pastures in the USofA, UK, Australia..), nothing more,  nothing less.. Restricted by their nation. Their people. Their surroundings. As Mark Caine once said, “the first step towards success is taken when you refuse to be a captive of the environment in which you first find yourself in.” Abdul Kalam said something too on the likes of dreaming big and getting thoughts transformed into action. Easier said than done.  Perhaps schools should teach dreaming along with learning. Perhaps.

But what about now? What about those brilliant students in my generation, muffled by circumstances? How will they open the windows that have been sealed for generations? It’s not fair.

Global History: Creating a Nation of Idiots

I hate my Global Studies class. I mean, no. Let me start over. I like my class and my teacher is pretty amazing too. But our curriculum, our textbooks, review books, practice questions and the rest of that mess are horrible. I mean it’s supposedly “Global” studies but all it does is mock 80% of the world. Some of it just makes me so mad, even when the subject has no connection to me. My friend asked me why I care and honestly, I don’t know why. But these few days have just completely annoyed me. And since I only write on this thing when I’m annoyed, here you go… my disorganized mess of thoughts.