The good old teaching days...

I had taken a couple of days off to go to Coimbatore on ‘Business’. I like putting it that way, it makes you feel important. Anyway, I was out there on project work, and on my first evening there, I was with Seetha at Gautham’s place for dinner. Gautham’s mum teaches languages and we got talking about her profession. I could relate to whatever she way saying because I used to do some teaching myself, ‘part-time’, for some extra pocket money. Those were the good days, man. Somehow, after I started on the MBA, there was no time to teach, and the vocation just fizzled out.

The first student I took in was Shoaib, who was then in class XI. He wanted help with French, and suddenly, I was a French tutor! Shoaib had his Quarterly Examinations the following week and he did not want to flunk French. But he did not know it too well, either. So we started with the alphabets, and moved on to the conjugations, and Shoaib passed. You have no idea how smug I felt. These classes were a lot of fun, because I was hardly older that the boy and it was not like a teacher-student relation at all. But they say there is strength in numbers, right. We were in a one-is-to-one ratio then, and Shoaib was a good boy. After he passed the darn exam, he became the ‘Boy who passed’, and I got popular overnight, as the ‘Girl who can make you pass French’. Such popularity is directly proportional to increase in the number of students. Soon enough, I had two more minds to ignite- Jason and Vivek. Now it was three-is-to-one, and I was doomed. A typical day would go thus:

Jason (J), Shoaib (S) and Vivek (V) arrive 30 minutes late. I’m not complaining, because I get to catch up on my beauty sleep. They trio saunter in, complaining about the sun or the traffic or football- They were all football players, National or State, I don’t remember.

J-What Gita, its Sunday afternoon, and we have tuition! We had practice all morning too!

Me- And exams next week right?

(More grumbling. I’m grinning, though. I won, right?)

S- Hey, I got a new phone, see.

Me-Whoa! Super cool man! (Anything compared to my camera-less, FM-less, MP3-less Nokia 2600 was considered super.) So, shall we start? What are we doing today? Passe compose? What has your teacher covered?

(At the same time)

S- Hey my sister is getting married in two months!

J- We are leaving to Vellore next week for selections!!

V- Hey, I am doing a solo dance for Farewell!!!

You get the general idea, don’t you? They would follow various strategies, the buggers J If everything failed, they would make up some non-existent boyfriend and watch me blush. But they were such sweet boys, and they did study! Shoaib scored a rank in French too. And then, all too suddenly, two years just flew...And we were done. They were my first ever batch of ‘students’ and they will always remain close to my little heart.

I even tried my hand at teaching Italian for three guys. In this case, they were all older than me. The moment they heard that I was a student, they all had these identical grins, and I knew this was going to be no better than my first batch. These guys were all working professionals, and one of them was even married. Twenty minutes into the first class, one of them, had a doubt.

“Gita, what’s for Fuck you in Italian?”

Now I did not know what was Fuck you in Italian. In fact, I did not know any swear word in Italian. I told them that the swear word session comes much later, not this early into the course.

Phew. It sure was fun too, though. And it was good for the pocket money. And I did learn a lot. These boys were good students too, and asked sensible doubts later into the course. And they gave me a glowing appraisal at the end of the course, and the boss kept offering me courses over and again.

Then the MBA happened, and I was cut off from civilization for two whole years, and did not take up any more ‘teaching assignments’. But every time I think about the good times, I can’t help but grin widely. And if any of you guys are reading this, thank you J You were all just too good! Cheers!

  

Erm. Yeah, whatever!

This might sound excessively school-girlish, and not just me...Most of my friends are also horror struck by this silly behaviour of mine. I mean, if it has come down to me writing a post about it...! One part of me does feel let down, too. By another part of myself. Ugh.
So it finally happened. The unthinkable. Never in my wildest dreams would I have imagined that a movie adaptation of a book would make me pick that book off the racks and read it. It was one night (another insomnia attack)when this harmless DVD lay within reach and though I was never a fan of this genre of ‘young adult’ stuff, I played it nevertheless.
Twilight.
Though I was reading the Bourne series then, and I never abandon books like this, by the noon next day I had all the four books ready and waiting. Now the irony was that I was very anti-Twilight all this while. Because it was simply NOT for people of my age!! My friend Sandya tried the ‘Shame on you’ trick on me but it did not work. Then I get to the books, finishing them off pretty quick, and as always, the movie paled in comparison. But it was this character that got me all hyper. Of course you all know who it is. Almost all the females who have read the series would be fantasizing about this man-vampire -Edward Cullen.

(Sigh*)

Now, I’m feeling disgusted. I assumed I was beyond crushes and everything, especially the ‘fictional’ ones. I haven’t had many of those, anyway. My last stable fictional crush was Ron Weasley, when I was in class nine. If you looked into my copy of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, you would find a faint pink tinge over the letters ‘Ron’ through the entire book. No it was not lipstick. Just colour pencil shading. Yes, I was crazy then. And Now!!
It is kind of alarming. Yesterday I was sitting in my friend Badri’s place. He was away on a phone call for two minutes, and when he got back I was ogling at Robert Pattinson in vampire attire, thanks to Google. That guy so perfectly fit the role! And see, just setting things clear, it’s the character called Edward that I like. And Pattinson just gives shape to the imagination..Like, you get it, don’t you? I might be crushing on Ron Weasley, but not the Ron that Rupert Grint plays. Grint is just an adaptaion I’d make do with, when I’m too tired for imagination. And now, there is this collage of Edward Cullen in posing in varied angles which is my desktop wallpaper. And my mobile phone wall paper. And I am feeling very very dumb with myself.
But I think Edward has gotten himself all this fanfare, because Stephanie Meyer has sculpted him that way. The kind of boy that all girls wish for. The understanding, caring, giving in, protective, possessive guy, who would always be there, no matter what. With just the right amount of give-and-take, just the right amount of jealousy, and trust, ample enough to keep them both going. Yeah, I know what the boys would say-If the girl was worth it, the guy would go to any extent for her. It takes two hands to sound a clap.
But what does ‘worth it’ exactly mean? Somewhere, it all boils down to the one word called love right? Now, that noun is an enigma. It might contain all the feelings that I listed in the previous paragraph, but, I believe, there is something more. Something that would make the difference.
And this term called ‘soul mate’. How would you know who your soul mate is? I mean, it sounds all nice and everything. I, for one, have a good idea of what I want my soul mate to be like. He (yes, soul or no soul, it’s definitely a he) should okay with having lots of animals around the place, like long walks and the beach and travelling, and books, and be a little patient and of course, caring, understanding, etc. But that is nothing to do with the soul, right..Anyway, it is just too confusing, too much of unnecessary thinking more like. I guess it would be nice if he was someone whom I wouldn’t have to put an act, to please, someone who could put up with all my crankiness and still call it cute (gross..I’m getting mushy now. Let us stop here for now) So That’s that. Till then, I’d just get back to dreaming about Cullen.