Aao apne Vidyalaya ka: SPV in snapshots

Since I find myself very often searching for blogs on Sardar Patel Vidyalaya SPV - my school for 14 years of my life, i thought I should dedicate atleast one post to it! So if any of u SPV -lovers/nostalgic haters pop in , do leave a note :)

Some of my funnest memories of SPV are in Junior school - our little junior building with junior parks made the real "senior" school seem so formidable. My favorite parts (varied according to my age) were the jungle gym - it took me a long time to get enough courage to hold the bars and clamber down till the middle, but when I did it was a real thrill! Then ofcourse the swings - although I was scared of them as well (shites I think I was a poop in school!) - esp after I fell down and before I could recover the swing came and hit me on my head. More than the pain it was the embarassment that made me semi-traumatised for the rest fo my life!

Then there was Mala Mam (oops Aunty) who i loved and hated at the same time - she was a very different person then, very jovial, very unpredictable and a really energetic Home room teacher..., Shravat Aunty who we were all petrified off esp since she was notorious for boxing ears and throwing our noteboooks into the dustbin, that too from a distance, if we got our sums/tables wrong! I used to have nightmares about her till age 20...
Promila Aunty, who I adored, she must have been barely the age I am now, but she seemed so cosy mummy type then....

Lunch time in canteen when Narayan Bhaiya would serve us rajma/idli-sambhar, poha and lots of delicious stuff, and we had to raise our hands to ger seconds and show our empty plates as proof to the hoem room teacher that we were not wasting any food. And ofcourse there was chubby Prabhat who would keep eating hours after we had all packed up!

How can I forget Assembly time, although I think i enjoyed that more after coming to middle school when I got to sing in the choir. We had the most amazing collection of somgs for all seasons and all occasions. Remember the one on monsoon "Aaya saawan jhuki re badariya, meha barse re o bhaiyan.." that was one of my ever favorites, and for some reason the really moral preachy one "kaam shuru karte nahi bhaye se neeche log.." and "dakshini bayaar chali, dakshini bayar re" . I think I like the last one for vanity reasons - Uma bhai loved the way I sang this one, almost as much as he liked the singer of our class - Aditi! I beleive she has become a big shot dancer and has acted in some movie as well...

By class IX I had become a part of the bad girls - with the shortest skirts possible, hanging out and bunking classes with the bad boys (Rono, Deba, Akshat, Tirtho... that's all I remeber!). Ambu and I had this record of bunking every single english class in class XII till Princy called us in! We did teh same for Sanskrit classes with guruji - when Ambu and I would just sneak into the nursing home (what was it called?? which was run by Basu mam?), sit either on the stairs or lie down on the beds and chat till class ended! the few classes we did attend the only purpose was to "flirt" with the boys from C section (I think it was Gautam and Ambar and maybe someone else!)

It's strange that I don't feel insecure writing real names in this blog. I guess cos it was so so far back and all the names I mention have disappeared in space soemwhere! Class IX onwards were probably the best times I had in SPv- altho they were alos the most difficult times in terms of dicovering myslef. I wasn't sure whether I was the bad "smoker drinker short skirt" type or the good (read benji) type! I liked girls from both sides of this dichotomy - but I guess I schose to fit in the former. Ofcourse I never did make it to the real cream of the wanted girls - the twins and some more rich kids! It's hilarious when u think back about the things that mattered in school - whether u were buying a choco bar or a plain orange bar, whether u were cool enough to be loved by the school shrink, how many "boys" knew u existed, how many visits to Khan market Chonas and Pat-a cake did u make per month...!

Oh, how could I forget Sports week where my house - Neeti- always came last! It was one week of non stop fun - with the hot tents out in the sun and flags waving, kids running jumping screaming - and the march past Neeti house bae se tez chal, ek do ek...:)

Another cool thing SPV had was the "food festival" where people mostly parents I think would bring food from all parts of the country and as far as I can recall it was either very cheap or for free. Panna, bisibela hulianna (or soemthing to that effect!), shikhand, chaat, mmmmmmmmm I wonder if they still have that. And then on Basant Panchami we would get Makke ki roti and sarso ka saag?? I think I am hungry - and my memories are becoming too food-centric as a result!