By Anshay Saboo, Class VII A
(Part 2)
Time flew by until the first day of school in India. Two things about schools here. First, we have an extremely strict school uniforms. Apart from uniform pants and shirt, we have uniform socks, shoes, and backpacks. Second, we have no cubbies. We have to bring all of our books and notebooks to school every day! It was terrible! [Stop laughing Dan. It’s worse than it sounds].
Fifth grade here was not what I had expected. If I were back in the US I would be studying about vacuoles and xylems, whatever those are. [Okay, Dan; A part of a cell and a tube used to transport water; thanks for the science lesson; why don’t we do History next?]. When I came here the first thing we studied was the life cycle of a plant and the parts of a seed. I think I remember doing that lesson in first grade.
So anyway, when I first walked into the school, my first thought was – look at the size of this school. Including the building and grass fields, this school was easily four times as big as my school back home. When I first came here, I was going into the fifth grade. The second I walked into my classroom, thirty-five kids swarmed around me, welcoming me and peppering (more like bombarding) me with questions. My teachers were all really nice to me, although Indian class [FINE Dan; HINDI Class; Gosh, I don’t think I’m going to survive this] was kind of a roadblock.
For the first few periods, I was as curious as… [Come on Dan, help me! What’s curious? Uh… Oh! Wait – I got it! I was as curious as George! Haven’t you seen Curious George? Wow, Dan. Sometimes I think that you’ve never experienced being a kid]. I was as curious as George about what was going on in the class. But then I started getting the hang of Hindi [See, Dan. I can learn!] and was able to participate in the classes.
As it turns out, I’m not alone. Around halfway through the fifth grade I met Ayush Baweja, another kid who came from the United States of America. He was actually an Easterner [NEW YORK! Jeez, Dan; Don’t you know slang?] and had this STUPID idea that Westerners [Yes, Dan; like me] always say ‘howdy.’ Apparently he thinks of us like cowboys (The Wild, Wild, West? Get it?)
It was hardest to adapt to the food. For lunch at school in the US of A, we could choose between a variety of juices, sandwiches, salads, and snacks including pizza and pasta and burgers and hot dogs and macaroni for our lunch. Here, all we get is rice and dal [Don’t look at me like that, Dan. It means lentils] and roti and sabji [That means Indian bread with cooked vegetables]. The only choice we have is to either eat it or eat it [I’m serious, Dan. We don’t even get an option to beat it. Get it? Man, you have no sense of humor.].
Somehow, I made it through the fifth grade and passed my exams with flying colors [I’ll show you my report card, Dan. Then you can laugh at my A+’s]. Now I was onto the sixth grade. I was in middle school.
In the senior wing, we could play on the field after lunch and play inside during short break. In short, we had more freedom. We started getting these new handouts called E2sheets [It stands for ‘exhaustive exercises’, Dan.] There is one E2 for every chapter we do in almost all subjects. The basic rule is that after we finish the chapter in school, we get the E2 and a deadline for which we have to submit the notebook.
And then there’s the third language option. We have to choose to study French or Sanskrit as part of our grade. I guess you can figure out what I chose. [Wow, Dan! You figured it out! There’s a big chance that a person who barely knows Hindi will choose Sanskrit! Sometimes I regret hiring you, Dan.] French actually was very fun. Our teacher was really nice and I already had a head start from French tutoring in the States [YES, I mean the United States, Dan. How much did you get in Geography?].
Day by day, I battled my way through the sixth grade and eventually won the war. Seventh grade, here comes the American.
Seventh grade was around 90% like the sixth grade (No need for in-depth descriptions here). The only differences were the teachers and lessons we studied. Also, I was dealing with a whole new batch of classmates. Until now, my class had the same children in it. Now over half of my former classmates were switched out and new ones were brought in.
Now I’m around halfway through the seventh grade. There’s not much more to record now, so I’m stopping this recording. But I guarantee you; this story is FAR from done.
