There was a time I wore handchains on my wrists, wristbands, bracelets. Not so long ago—I think I was in my third year of honors then. I still remember how utterly matter-of-fact my mother’s voice was when she threw my expensive pair of magnetic earrings out the window, saying, “These things look better on slum girls’ ears; if someone finds them, they’ll be very happy, dear.” I never wore rings again. When I would go to teach at my own coaching center, matching sunglasses, jeans, t-shirt, sneakers, belt, rings, handchains and all—I’m sure some parents would wonder, what could this strange-looking young man possibly teach their sons and daughters! Many would come and say to me, “I’ve come to meet the director sir of Paul’s Coaching Home, call him over” (seeing me, perhaps “sir” wouldn’t come to their lips).
When the number of students at the coaching center grew, I started keeping a cane. The students would say, “Sir, beating doesn’t go with your appearance.” A boy in hip-hop getup thrashing kids like a schoolmaster—boys and girls, no one spared. How did that look? I would make them literally memorize books cover to cover for MCQs. Everyone called me the “objective guru!” I would make students solve huge English worksheets. I often wove various dreams in their eyes, taught them to dream of growing up, never let anyone think they couldn’t do it. I taught them to recognize the places of strength within themselves. It feels wonderful to think that they have grown up now, are growing up. This good feeling itself is far more precious. My coaching center had students from class nine to honors level. During that time I read voraciously—it felt strange to say “I don’t know” in front of students. Many of my dialogues are still quoted by students when we meet occasionally. “Sir, you used to tell me this, you used to say that.” Let me share a few:
# You’ll do the math problem exactly as I’ve shown—with every comma, period, semicolon. (Proyas reminded me)
# If you don’t feel like studying, get out of class. ….. Bring the payment tomorrow. (Sultan reminded me)
# What’s this? What’s your problem? ……. Do you know what a beating is? A beating? (Ratul reminded me)
# Questions are neither easy nor hard—questions are standard. (Pranto reminded me)
# There’s a concept behind everything. (Tanvir reminded me)
# You must provide every side note. (Soumya reminded me)
# Talking in class doesn’t increase your smartness! (Jevin reminded me)
# After giving a thrashing, you would say, “Oh! You seem embarrassed!?” When we said, “No!” you’d say, “Shame shame! Are you shameless?” (Shubho reminded me)
# Two students came late. They were cousins, Toran and Turin; they always came together. “Turin, why are you late?” “Sir, I was late getting up from sleep.” “Toran, why were you late?” “Sir, I was late because I went to wake him up.” “Oh I see, I understand. You fell asleep with him when you went to wake him up, right?”
# I’ll slap you and throw you out the window. (Can’t say who reminded me of this)
# I’ll remove the curtain rods and beat you with them. (Can’t say who reminded me of this)
What else did I used to say; I don’t remember.
I was very strict at the coaching center, practically a Hitlerian regime. I would address boys as “tumi” and girls as “tui”—I never explained this to anyone. Even now I laugh remembering those things. I felt most comfortable teaching English and Bengali. The joy of reciting Bengali poems and teaching them with countless references—you can’t find that joy in anything else in the world. Right at that moment it felt like I was creating it all over again! I taught other subjects equally well too. During that time I would work like a ghost, staying up night after night preparing huge lecture sheets for students, giving notes in difficult literary styles. Students still talk about those summary and essence notes. I would give English notes using GRE words in complex grammatical structures. On days when there were no academic classes, I would teach them free preparation for IBA, university and engineering admissions, make them solve worksheets. Ahh! Those days!! There’s no counting how many hundreds of times I’ve read and taught the matriculation and intermediate books.
2002 to 2011. Such a long time!! Everyone said I was wasting my life teaching students. Everyone had assumed I would spend my whole life as a teacher. Yet that work felt easy to me, so I enjoyed it; studying didn’t appeal to me at all. What was my fault! Later I saw that teaching had been the most useful thing in my life. “Life’s treasures will never be lost—no matter how neglected they lie in dust.” Life takes us where it will, how it will—we can never imagine it. Life is always stranger than fiction. I miss those days terribly. Teaching with everything I had in front of a classroom full of mesmerized eyes, touching some people’s lives, launching so many students on their dream journeys—that’s a tremendous achievement! I don’t find such peace in anything else anymore. That’s why even now, whenever I get the chance, I teach friends wallowing in sadness to take the oath of touching dreams with the audacity of a catalyst; as much as I can, however I can; and as long as I can, I will keep teaching. Because whether anyone else knows it or not, from my own life I know what a terribly painful thing it is to keep wallowing in sadness!
“তাইতো এখনও সুযোগ পেলেই মন-খারাপ-করে-থাকা বন্ধুদের স্বপ্নকে স্পর্শকের স্পর্ধায় ছুঁয়ে ফেলার শপথ নিতে শেখাই; যতোটা পারি, যেভাবে পারি; এবং যতদিন পারি, আমি শিখিয়ে যাবো। ”
মুগ্ধতা কেবলই মুগ্ধতা !!
সম্মান ও শ্রদ্ধা !!
🙏🙏🙏