School Day Reminiscences - I

These past couple of months have been especially nostalgic for me. I happened to reconnect with a few of my juniors from school on Facebook, and slowly all these fascinating people from my childhood days seemed to come out of the woodwork. My husband cropped my picture from my Grade 10 class photo, and jokingly posted it as my profile picture on Facebook because he thought it was cute, and lo and behold, it stirred a whole lot of nostalgia in many of my schoolmates and opened the floodgates of memories past! I absolutely revel in walking down memory lane because it puts my life in perspective, helps me relate to folks with our shared recollections of teachers, events, friends, and the like, and makes me feel proud of how far we have come in life from those days of fun and childish laughter.

Well, school was the Seventh Day Adventist School on Travellers' Bungalow Road (TB Road) in smalltown Madurai of those days, in Tamilnadu, India. It was founded in the mid-1960s, following the establishment of the SDA Church, predominantly for the church members' children, but then grew into a behemoth of education for the general public. My parents, Mr. D.G. Samuel and Mrs. Mercy Samuel, were actively involved in the forming of both the church and the school, and my mother was one of the pioneer teachers of the school. I must admit I had the honour and privilege of attending this great institution right from Day 1 of its inception, until I graduated from the Grade 10 ICSE class, the first ICSE batch in the whole of Madurai! My memories of my school days are nothing but pleasant, my teachers extraordinary in what they imparted to me, my friendships so precious, and my childhood days full of sunshine, geniality, and general bonhomie! Needless to say, all that I am today is because of my wonderful school and its superlative teachers!

I remember very vividly my Grade 1 teacher, Mrs. Abraham Koshy, whose daughter Anita Koshy was in the same class as well. I credit this teacher for having taught us reading skills at a very young age. I was 5 at that time (1967) and would eagerly await my turn to read aloud from the English Reader, a practice that was continued at home, my Dad relaxing in his easy chair with eyes closed shut, as I sat opposite him and read aloud from the Reader's Digest. Pastor Samraj was the first Principal of the school, and he and his family lived on campus. His son Edison was a few years my senior, and we children used to play with him on the sandy grounds of the school. On the side of the chapel next to the road leading to Ellis Nagar was a huge tree with fragrant white blossoms (not sure of the name...they were shaped like trumpets!), and I can still recall the heady scent of those flowers early in the morning, as we filed into the chapel for our morning service!

Memories will continue...