Teacher's day

In the morning Popy and Reshma wished me a Happy Teacher's day. Today is 5th September commemorated as Teacher's day.

I recall doing teacher's day at school but not at M.Sc levels. I think Dr. Manjrekar is correct in his assessment: we were too busy painting the department red to worry about anything including teacher's day.

But the students of today's generation remember it better than we did. So two of last year's M.Sc students came to give me a card and to touch my feet. That always makes me feel uncomfortable for we do not have the tradition of touching anyone's feet at home.

And then I got a surprise card from a ex-project student and another one from a student who did a project in my lab and is now in California.

All in all a very nice day.

I remember my teachers. Strangely I remember most of the teachers who taught me in 11th class. Strange because I did most of my studies at KV Sector VIII, RK Puram except for 11th which I did in Lucknow. The school was small, the teachers were friendly and innovative, actually. There was Mrs. Duggal whose English exams were fun because she always gave us space to write a short prose at the end of the exam. Mrs. Kumar who taught us Physics and could not be bothered with exams. And Mr. Tripathi who taught us Chemistry and instilled in me the habit of keeping extensive records of the experiments done.

Then in B.Sc. there was Dr. Sarabhai who worked harder than I did for the gold medal and who was kind enough to do all the paper work needed for the graduation ceremony. I think the parents visited him when the letter of the award ceremony came because I was away in Baroda.

And finally there was Joel, whom I treated more as a colleague than as a teacher. I ran the lab and bullied him just as I bully my brother. But he took it all good-naturedly and let me do the experiments my own way.

So it is to all of them a Happy Teacher's Day.