Chapter 14: jurithewriter has started writing her story: NDA English school
The NDA kids studied in NDA English School. The school was established
in the 1950s by Jesuit nuns and at some point of time given over to the NDA
administration.
From the D2 circle, the road forked onward, one went uphill heading
to the E3 residential area, and the other went into the flat valley where the
School was nestled at another stretch of the foothill, approximately a kilometer
and half from the D2 circle. The school was a pre-primary and primary school
and taught up to Class 4 after which one would have to either go to the Kendriya
Vidyalaya near the Gol Market or to a school inside Pune city.
The school buildings were old abandoned army barracks, there
were two buildings one on either side of the road that ran through the centre
going further steep uphill, meeting the E3 road and ending at the farther boundary of
NDA which was the Peacock Bay. The building on the left had two classrooms, a
lower kindergarten and an upper kindergarten. Beyond was a forest, a narrow track
went into the forest where the villagers would enter to collect wood or pass
through into NDA, perhaps to work as maids or malis- gardeners. A small tree with
white flowers, I remember the tree distinctly but never learned the name, stood
gloriously outside the upper kindergarten classroom.
Often times a plane would pass the skies and all the
children would rush outside, clapping our hands and screaming ‘aeroplane,
aeroplane’ egged on by the teachers.
On the other right side of the road, the barracks were
longer and housed classes one to four. As the number of children were few, each
grade had just one section. This also had the administrative office and I
remember Mrs Malakar, in crisply ironed saris and bob cut hair, with black
rimmed glasses sitting behind the desk and peering over the glass rims,
looking at the parents when they went to meet her. At home she was Malakar
aunty as my parents socialized with the Malakars. Uncle was a Professor and a
colleague of my dad.
Our teachers were mostly the wives of the NDA officers, both
uniformed and non-uniformed. The uniformed officers were transferred out every
two to three years so there would be change in teaching staff accordingly. I
have no recollection of any teacher other that Mrs Malakar.
Jumi and I would either be dropped or picked-up to and from
school by my father on his scooter or we would walk back home in our beige
frocks and red elastic hairbands or ribbons. Walking was a culture in NDA and
back then we kids thought nothing of walking across the vast campus from our
homes to the movie auditorium (Habibur Hall), or to the swimming pool or the
indoor badminton and squash courts or to the café at the Officers mess. I often
dream of our picturesque walk from school to home. The virgin forests that we
saw on both sides of the road were covered with vast areas of swaying cosmos
flowers. The flora was more desert than tropical. The trees had small leaves
with thorns and spines interspersed. There were ber trees, berries that were
sour and green when raw and yellow and sweet when ripe and dotted the forest
floor yellow amidst a green grass carpet. Occasional striped squirrels climbed
trees targeting the berries and crossed the roads. A deer or two would be seen grazing the forest
grass and looking curiously at us sometimes. On rainy days, when we would be
partly protected by raincoats, a male peacock would be dancing with his
feathers fully spread out, trying to woo a peahen. Since the roads were
perfect, we would splash into puddles on the edges wetting our black Bata
leather shoes. We walked and ran and had springs in our steps. We had puppy
love and puppy crushes and those are other stories, perhaps the next one.
The location of NDA English School was shifted to near the
Gol Market, I was very sorry to know that when I visited NDA more than a decade
back.
