Some of the best days of my life was the time I spent in my school. Man!! what fun days those were… those kiddish games that we played, those childish fights we gals used to have with the guys just to prove one is better than the other, the sports day that we had every year where I never missed participating in 800mts running race and 400mts relay cuz I always knew I would either come 1st or 2nd, those lectures where we either used to make fun of some funny teachers or shiver in front of some others who were dangerously strict!

Lemme tell you one such incident that happened to me when I was in my 8th std. There was this one teacher, Mrs. Maltiprakash and she was our Hindi teacher. I can’t explain how strict she was, the reason I used the word “dangerously strict” was cuz her favorite hobby was slapping others. Gosh!! she just needs a reason to do the honors.

Everybody HAD to get their “Hindi Textbooks” during her class, failing to do so… you might have guessed what would happen. Some of her top 5 “Cannot Do” things in the class were - you cannot murmur, yawn, laugh, come late to the class, ask permission to go to go the toilet(!) and many more silly things. I usually made sure that I don’t get into any kinda trouble with her and followed all the rules set aside by her like a very disciplined gal. But as usual luck doesn’t favor you all the time. There was this one unfortunate day when I experienced one of the most embarrassing moment of my life.

She had given us some assignment where we had to write some stupid essay. I had totally forgotten about it when I went back home. The next morning, when my friend Deepika asked me about the essay, I almost fainted. I also forgot to get my assignment book. Her lecture was 2 1/2 hrs away and I was so confused not knowing what to do.

Suddenly an idea striked me, I went to the local telephone booth and called up my mom. Since my mom used to top in Hindi back in school, I had requested her to write the essay for me and send across the book through my dad’s office boy Nazeem.

Time passed and Nazeem was still not there. The class started and the 1st question teacher asks is, all those students who haven’t completed their essay stand up. Obviously I had to stand. She then asks each person the reason for not completing the task. My turn was one person away, and then suddenly there is a knock on the door. Guess what, Nazeem was there with my book. He handed over the book to the teacher and I explained to her that I had completed the essay but had forgotten the book at home. She was so impressed with me at that moment, cuz I made sure that the book reached me.

But wait! That was not the end.

The class was over and 2 hrs later I am asked to come to her room. I was praying to god that nothing goes wrong this time.

I went to her and she handed over a letter to me. Guess what that letter was. It was a letter written by my mom to me and kept inside the book in which she said, she couldn’t write a 2 page essay as told by me but could manage to write only a single page cuz of time constraints. At that moment I felt like running away from there.

Now I was ready to get slapped by her. when I looked at her with fear I couldnt believe what I saw, she was actually smiling. For the first time in my life I actually saw her smiling. She then told me to get back to the class and not repeat it again.