PATC Diary: February 9

Dateline 9 February 2015
Went to eat at a restaurant. Done eating, plate empty, sitting there. The waiter comes over and asks quite predictably, "Sir, finished eating?" What does that mean? What's the fellow trying to say? At Pizza Hut the other day, hearing such a question I just said, "No brother, still got the plate left to eat!" But not everyone's a wise guy like me. Anyway, why am I saying all this? Yes, that's what I was getting to.
Today such an important exam, and after studying all night still feeling unfinished thinking it wasn't really finished, this poor soul sits under the lamppost's fog-soft light in the early dawn with her study sheet, absorbed in learning, when four brick-head boys walk up and ask, "Apa, are you studying?" The girl could have easily said, "Oh no! Can't you see I'm standing here with gladiolas waiting for you all!" Instead, she smiled shyly and said, "Yes, just doing a little revision." The white monkeys stood side by side and all gave a massive salute in unison. In 'Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom,' while biting into a guava, Indiana Jones told the girl, "Nothing shocks me—I'm a scientist." Today's apa, after that collective salute, quite coolly went back to reading. It wasn't even 6 yet—whatever could be studied before the PT whistle blew was pure profit! I'm so fortunate to have witnessed this extraordinary Vidyasagar-like scene from so close. Looking at the apa, I thought maybe at that very moment she was thinking to herself, "Nothing shocks me—I'm a nerd." I felt like taking a torch, following the apa step by step, shining it on her sheet, and somehow getting her that Rector's Medal. Syed Mujtaba Ali, borrowing from the Italian woman poet Filicaja, had written:
O globe of sweetness, why did you hold so much sweetness, alas!
The land of Italy, forgetting faith, prostrated at your feet.
I too felt like borrowing from master Mujtaba and writing:
O Rector's Medal, why did you hold such allure, alas!
PATC's intellectual clan, forgetting life, prostrates at your feet.
The whistle blew. Walking began. Dense fog. A trap of dim light. Some chilly, chilly sleep caught in it. Trees stretching and yawning. Birds beginning their day. The whistle blew. Walking ended. Back to the dormitory. Sleep began.
Today PT is off. Why? Why indeed! Today's the Module 1 exam! Don't we need to study? Need to get good marks, stay in the top thirty. Those who study get to travel abroad! How happy I am! We have 23 modules in total. That means at least 23 days of PT off! PT off means sweet morning sleep. Ah, why are exams so beautiful! What harm would a few more modules have done? We want to learn, meaning we want to give more and more exams! PATC doesn't understand, doesn't understand...
Today for the first time, the PMC (President of the Mess Committee) didn't lay any eggs for breakfast; I mean, didn't arrange for eggs. Everyone's quite happy. Today in the exam, no one will lay an egg either, such is the joy. Salute to the PMC's sense of humor. This PMC's food management and menu selection are quite good anyway, and today's little joke was rather pleasant. I noticed everyone seemed quite anxious. Being tense before an exam is also a kind of basic courtesy. I'm trying desperately to feel at least a little tension about the exam that's about to begin, to be serious, but I just can't manage it; instead, watching the others made me want to laugh somehow. I asked one serious fellow, "Say brother, is this chicken from a local farm? Or a Pakistani farm? This doesn't seem like a hen, but a rooster. Right, brother?" He said nothing in reply.
The exam happened. Battle battle formation. Question paper arrived. What delightfully good questions! It's impossible to answer these questions by rote memorization. All those who came relying on cramming got caught red-handed! Thanks to PATC. Very nice creative-type questions. Nothing came from the lecture sheets. Had to make things up using common sense. How happy I am! Started writing. Among the things I wrote, sharing a couple in Bengali:
# How does your cadre serve the nation's citizens...I wrote everything I know and everything I don't know. The happy and hopeful thing is, no one from my cadre is here as a faculty member. Therefore, whatever I write is correct.
# Financial integrity alone is not the only yardstick for evaluating a government officer—explain...I cooked up a complete mishmash of literature, history, poetry—everything.
# How will you apply the learning from this foundation training course in your office work?...Whatever came to mind and didn't come to mind, mixing all the sweetness-divinity-Katrina of the heart, I wrote it all down.
In today's exam, some people took many loose sheets. I couldn't even finish the last 3 pages of the notebook they gave us. The one-hour exam was done in 50 minutes for me. Tried to submit the answer book, they wouldn't take it. Everyone busy writing. No one looking at anyone else. Taking this opportunity, I gazed to my heart's content at the beauties in class. Ah, lovely examination! Where's the similarity between Durga Puja's anjali time and exam time? In both I'm present, but during that time I have nothing to do. Wasting time isn't right, the wise have said. So what else to do!
After the exam, met with Vidyasagar apa. I was escaping when she asked, "How was the exam?" Showing all 32 teeth I said, "Very good. I took 3 loose sheets. How many did you take?" Smiling the way we do when our lips crack in winter, she said, "What! 3! I only took 1. But brother, why did they do this today? If questions don't come from the sheets, what's the point of giving sheets at all?"
I remembered last night. The night before the exam. What do you do on such a night? I consider Andy Dufresne's philosophy from 'The Shawshank Redemption'—topping IMDb's top 250—as the only philosophy for pre-exam nights: Get busy living, or get busy dying. Have preparation? Okay, brush up. No preparation? Okay, go to sleep. In my personal experience, the exam turns out more or less the same either way. So, nothing to do? Watch a movie. Thanks to Tanuja.
After today's class, two things occurred to me:
One. The fear of the bullet lasts only as long as you haven't fired it. Once you've fired the bullet, your power ends. The best power is not to use the power.
Two. When people mention their educational qualifications, if they voluntarily only mention where they completed their master's, in most cases you have to assume they didn't do their graduation from a very 'good institution.'
When I used to teach students, while making English notes for them, I'd use the most difficult GRE words and convoluted sentences. What was my fault? School and college teachers prefer to give higher marks for 200-year-old English. So I was somewhat forced to make notes that way. For example, the beginning of an application to the headmaster/principal was like this: With due veneration and humble submission, I beg to lay before you the following prayer of mine for favour of your sympathetic consideration and kind perusal. The ending was like this: Under the circumstances furnished above, may I, therefore solicit and aspire that the splendidly benign personality and generosity you are fully endowed with would be softened enough to grant...I don't remember the rest. If any of my students happen to read this, think back a bit—didn't you lose your teeth learning such terrible, terrible English at a young age?! Now I think, if we cling to 200-year-old English, it'll take us another 200 years to learn smart English. Those who check papers, would you kindly think about this a bit?
Zillur Rahman Siddiqui sir used to say in class, "A modern person must know 3 things: Computer. English. Driving." I'm adding a bit. When it comes to learning English, I'd change the statement slightly like this: A modern Bengali...actually, why do we learn English? It often seems to me that we learn English because we're poor. What happens if we don't learn it? People in many developed nations don't know English, and they have no headaches about it either. When needed, the English learn their languages instead. Well, those of us who rattle off in English—how much Bengali do we really know? Even writing in Bengali now, there was a time I'd only write in English. And I believe this: you can't write good English without knowing good Bengali. This applies completely to those whose first language is Bengali. Some of you might argue against this with examples of Arundhati Roy or Vikram Seth. I'd tell them, though born to Bengali fathers or mothers, neither of their first languages was Bengali.
Some funny things came to mind in today's class after many days. Like, pagutadipati, kilaia hankaia dakat marile deshe shanti milibe, mithya tumi dash pipre, babar hoilo abar jor sarilo oshodhe, pisi chol jai, amar manushera gan kore eichha, and some more like these. Friends, well, tell me, what do these mnemonics represent? Remember?
The groom's family has come to see the bride. The girl is asked, "Let's see, spell 'ষ'!" The girl is asked to walk and show herself. The girl's father is asked, "How much land property do you have? How will you manage the wedding expenses?" Well, why do we suffer so much? Why does the bride's family even dignify such people with conversation? This thought came to me after hearing something in today's class.
On 26 July 1983, Princess Diana went to inaugurate a hospital in Grimsby. Seeing the mass hysteria of that day's overwhelming crowds, the next day 'The Sun' newspaper ran: "IT'S DI-MANIA! 100 collapse as fans go wild on walkabout." We're waiting—for the welfare of womankind, one day we too will get a word in English: Sal-Mania! Look, the papers are writing away: Saifreena. The Times of India on 13 October 2014 ran a headline like this: Saifreena to ring in their wedding anniversary at the Nawab's Pataudi Palace. Now the question is, what is Saifreena? Nothing much. A neologism of Saif Ali Khan and Kareena Kapoor's names. Bravo! But why aren't we creating 'uttachitraa'? What's the problem? We keep drinking chafi (tea+coffee), staying in motels (motor+hotel), about to ride maxis (motor+taxi), yet all the objection is to riding cycle+taxi! Somehow it feels strange to say that shortened! Fine, let's skip that! But where's this problem with uttachitraa? Then why are we letting Bengali cinema's craze slip away? Why should this side of Bengal be left out either?
Very well, I'll make the start myself. From now on, whenever you hear 'Darpachurna's' "You who are my poetry," exclaim, "Ah, those golden days of Rajjabari!" Well, will you say it?
I've actually decided that after we marry, I'll give the two of us some sort of combined name like that. If it sounds awful, then if necessary I'll change either her name or mine and give us a name we both like. Ha ha ha ha... For some reason I'm remembering a few lines from one of Purnandu Patri's poems in 'Kathopakathan.' I've performed this duet-style poem with several sweet-voiced beauties in various places. From there, I'm sharing some of Shubhankar-Nandini's dreams:
A house that touches the moon,
Spiral staircases twisted and turned like mystery novels
Dream scenes in golden frames at every bend
The head of a mythical deer, antlers and all
Why are you laughing? Tell me, why are you laughing?
- A severed deer hanging on the wall, unbearable!
The deer will stay in the forest, the forest will be
All around our bed
A small hill beneath our bed,
A waterfall bursting through the hill's belly.
- Yes, that's how it will be.
A waterfall through the hill, Kashmiri carpet over the waterfall
Rajasthani chandelier hanging upside down from the ceiling like a water sprinkler
Clouds against the window, fluffy Punjabi kurtas against the clouds,
Lucknow chikan embroidery on the kurtas.
Why are you laughing? Tell me, why are you laughing?
This afternoon, after cartoon-like basketball dribbling on the basketball court, on my way back to the room I saw a pavilion by a wilderness-like path covered with fallen leaves from disheveled trees arranged like a forest. You can sit on the curved benches inside, start conversations over coffee steam. I kept thinking, someday I'll return there on a contemplative winter evening, seeking warmth in coffee's intoxication. There's no one around that place. Only the faithful trees exist, the silence of their falling leaves. Sitting there, it would be very easy to transform this world into another planet. I'll have to keep returning here to find life in solitude's embrace.
Today's schedule has been the most hectic schedule for us at PATC so far. Even after sports today, there was a 2-hour evening session. The session was on some economic theories. It was conducted by a senior assistant secretary. What the sir taught in 2 hours, we had been taught in 3 classes in the Economics course at IBA. There were some graphs in his lecture too. He's also IBA material (read: 'alumni.' I felt like calling him 'material,' so I did). Started at six-thirty, ended at eight-thirty. Two hours flew by. It wasn't easy to explain several critical theories and graphs to mango public like us. How was the class? I'll just say this much, he succeeded. Let me do a little nepotism, shall I? IBA rocks!!
I generally don't mix much with very serious types. After class, one such person approached me, and just as in the morning I was about to walk away quickly, but before that he came up and I asked politely, "Namaskar, dada. How are you?" His response: "You were at IBA, weren't you? Could you explain the IS-LM model to me a bit?" Thinking it wasn't safe to stay long with someone who responds to greetings with academic queries, I somehow escaped from there and gave evidence of my vast IBA genius. In 'Paradise Regained' Milton had written:
The childhood shows the man,
As morning shows the day.
Had Milton met this dada before writing that, he would surely have written,
The greeting shows the nerd,
As morning shows the evening!