When I graduated out of 10th standard, my school gave me an award citing me as “Outstanding student of the year”. All that i had done to earn it was to talk too much in English Grammar class and thus get chucked out. Ever since i got that award, i have been trying my best to live up to the title.
I joined a different school in the opposite corner of the city for my 11th standard. Fifteen days into it, Ms. T, a highly senior and respected and feared teacher caught me talking in the last bench. She asked me to immediately get out of class. Having been emboldened by the award i had just received, i picked up my books, went up to her (the door was in front of the class close to the blackboard), said, “Thank you ma’am” and walked out. Being a newcomer i obviously didn’t care for reputations. I became a hero overnight.
This school proved to be fertile ground for me to display my outstanding talents. A couple of months after i had ‘staged a walkout’, i was caught in the assembly line (yes, this school believed that nursery kids and 12th standard students should be treated alike and hence made us line up everyday before we moved to our classrooms) with my collar button open and necktie pulled down (having been for 12 years in a school where we could wear sneakers as part of the uniform and there was no tie, etc., i could simply not reconcile myself to the idea of a necktie). I was asked to step out of the line and was made to stand in the school grounds for an hour “in the sun”. I found the November sun much better than the chill of the classroom and spent my time making small talk with some construction workers hanging around.
There were numerous other occasions where i proved myself. In my 12th, i was asked to get out of class for not doing my homework. I walked straight into the library and got down to some serious JEE mugging. Then there was this occasion when half my class was suspended because one of us (the teacher didn’t know who) sent an obscene message (something as bullshitty as “how the c**t are you?”) over the network. Remained outstanding until my mom had a chat with the principal after which i was let in.
However i wasn’t awarded the “outstanding student” award as it required that the recipient be outstanding for five years while i had put in only two years. Ravi, the guy who got the award, by the way, is my classmate here in IIMB.
My career took a severe beating in IIT as i had been forewarned by my uncle (who was a good friend of many of my profs) that no “misconduct” will be tolerated and if i attempt anything like i did in my school, i would take a minimum of eight years of B.Tech. I took temporary retirement and an uneventful four years passed during the course of which i became a ‘bachelor of technology’.
However i made a rousing comeback as soon as i stepped into the hallowed portals of IIMB. On the very first day, i had gone out between classes to wash my face and i find the door shut on me. i politely (something i find it hard to do – be polite) knocked on the door and the kindly prof. swamyji let me in saying that i was pardoned because it was the first class.
There was a lull again as i attended all but one of the classes in my first term. However, today, 2/3rd way into the second term, i became outstanding again.
We had a marketing case presentation today. Generally we put night outs the day before the presentation to complete it. Surprisingly yesterday we found the assignment to our liking, started early and would up by 1 am. We prepared an extremely long and comprehensive presentation. Some groupmates wished that we be called to present while i wished that given the length of the presentation we be simply asked to submit the slides.
I had a good sleep and attended the first class (and had a good nap there also). Next was the marketing class. As usual, i paid my respects to the coffee shop nad not so usually, decided to stop by on the way to wash my face.
Shit happened. I go to class at 10:12 (for a 10:15 class) and find the door locked. A polite knock doesn’t work this time (perhaps it was too polite and the prof didn’t hear or preferred not to hear). I open my phone and find that i don’t have the numbers of any of my groupmates! I frantically start messaging everyone in my class whose number i had. Only Ravi (he too was an outstanding student – remmber?) replies. he says that our group hasn’t been asked to submit and may be called upon to present. I vow to write a blog on this as soon as i’m back.
I wait outside the door. I perch myself on the ledge trying to hear whatz happening in class. I decide that if the next group called isn’t mine, i’ll go back to hostel and get a newspaper. After what seems to be an excrutiatingly long time (though it was only 15 minutes), the first group winds up. I brace myself thinking my group may be called and I be screwed. Soon there’s a message from Ravi. He had seen the wrong group number earlier! Our group had been asked to submit and there was no need for me to stick on there. I heaved a sigh of relief and walked back to the hostel. First thing i did on getting in was to start writing this. Now i guess i’m done with my masterpiece. Hope you liked it.
By the by (!!!), I hope to repeat this many more times and graduate out of IIMB with, among other awards, the prize for the “most outstanding student”.