Those 10 minutes

And Tonnes Of Emotions

Aadya Kapoor, X C & Kalpita Chakraborty, XI B, AIS Vasundhara 6

The school bell rings and students run outside the main gate to catch their bus. The scene unfolds in front of a curious eye.*

1.30 pm: The bus has arrived early. I wait for the bell to ring and children to come out.
1.45 pm: The bell rings as kids rush out. I look for the ones I’m supposed to take along. Giggling and chatting, they walk towards their buses. I feel irritated as the latecomers are nowhere in sight again.
1.46 pm: “Not again!” I exclaim to myself as I see Chintu walk towards the ice cream vendor. I am not letting any of them near my bus with that sweet treat in hand. Kids and melting objects together could only mean unmitigated disaster.
1.47 pm: A group of students huddle together in an important conversation. I spot Henna amongst them, and like always she is again talking. “Don’t you get time to talk in school?” I shout, as I usher her towards the bus. “Five minutes, bhaiya please” she says as usual. I will never understand these kids.
1.48 pm: The latecomers are yet to arrive. But thankfully there are others who start filing into the bus. Commotion, chatter and the fight for favourite seat ensues. “Its only a matter of half an hour,” I tell myself.
1.49 pm: “Rakesh bhaiya, I forgot my book in the class,” mutters Aman. Before I can say a word, he is already running out of the bus. “The bus won’t wait for you,” I shout, trying to dissuade him from going back. “Just five minutes!” This Aman, I tell you…literally a huge trouble in a small package.
1.50 pm: I start taking attendance of all the kids but the noise is driving me crazy. They just won’t shut up! Ugh kids!
1.51 pm: I am more than  halfway through the attendance sheet (not without difficulties), that his highness, Mr Chintu, finally graces us with his presence trying to act all innocent.
1.52 pm: I get back to my attendance, when I hear a round of laughter. As I raise my head to see what the commotion is about, my eyes widen. Oh! he has done it now, that little devil has spilled ice-cream on my bus seat. I knew this would happen. 1.53 pm: I narrow my eyes and scrunch my face in anger, his lower lip trembles. As I take the first step to go and scold him, his eyes well up. Oh God! I will never be able to do it, will I?
1.55 pm: The routine fights for the window seats have begun. “Please Rakesh bhaiya, ise bolo na…” I hear little Pihu crying as usual. I tear apart my promises of not intervening again, but it all seems worth it when she says “Thank you bhaiya.”
1.56 pm: With his book in hand, I see Aman running towards the bus. “Why should these little devils have all the fun?” I think to myself as I signal the driver to start the engine. Aman panics. I can hear “Please  Bhaiya…” from a distance.
1.57 pm: Finally, they are inside the bus. The bus starts and so does antakshari. I look at them and a smile escapes my face. “What would I do without them?” I think to myself, just when another one spills water on the floor! I heave a deep sigh and sit down on my seat.
*Curious eye is now rolling with a glint of happiness*

When villains complete their B.Ed

Be Grateful For The ‘Strict Teachers’ You Have Now

Avi Prabhakar, AIS Vasundhara 6, XII E

Enter ‘The Doom Universal School’, where the staff room radiates hatred, hunger and determination to make the students’ life a living hell. The teachers here are, ‘burdened with glorious purpose’, that being imparting knowledge to create villains imbued with evil. The bell rings announcing the start of the school day…
 
First period: Mathematics with Titan Thanos
With a wicked smile on his face that terrorises the students, Professor Thanos flips through the math book. Long prayer session of many remain unfruitful when they still end up getting him for their teacher and why wouldn’t they pray? It wasn’t truly a secret that he liked to fail half his class so the results are “perfectly balanced, as all things should be!” As he strolls up and down the class, children shudder at every sound made, hoping it is not a snap of his fingers that could turn them to dust. Gone are the days of being mean, unruly folks and chasing glowing rocks; it’s time to become All Universe Rank 1 or be wiped out.

Second period: Chemistry with Master Magneto
The class shakes violently. The students hide behind their capes, trying to escape the murderous rage of the teacher. They fail to answer his questions about elements and his powers over them. He literally pulls out elements from the earth to explain these hotheads but no, they are too dumb, a common feature of villains after all. The class troublemaker, Deadpool, has the nerve to ask him, “What if there are two carbon molecules together and so will they be ‘carbon dating’?” He gets his nimble self out of the window before he is smashed to bits.
Third period: Physics,
with Jarring Joker
The classroom is in an extremely delicate situation, literally. Lying around are grenades and C4 bombs, ready to incinerate the student’s most evil posterior. And guess what the physics professor, Joker, asks them with his most sinister smile “Why so serious?” He is absurdly ingenious and brainy enough to beat Einstein when it comes to explaining the laws of physics using bombs, guns and a student as the guinea pig. Last lesson, he used Robin strapped to a chair and threw him from the top floor to explain “For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.” The opposite reaction being screaming and Robin flattened like grease spot, accompanied by Joker’s barmy laughter.

Fourth period: Le français, avec Villainous Voldemort
The professor hates muggleborns and muggles alike. He twirls his wand in his fingers while his eyes glow blood red as Nagini slithers around his feet. He stares into the eyes of every single villain in the making, sitting right in front of him and dares them to question his invincibility. He eggs on Nagini in parseltongue, the lingo of snakes, to wait for her meal till the class is finished. He practices the cruciatus curse as frequently as he breathes. He is the most feared teacher when it comes to punishments. Its just rather ironical that he is the professor of the language of love.

Now that you have had this interesting insight into this school of villains, I’m sure that you are grateful for all those detentions, dossiers, the ‘get outta the class’ punishments and comparatively ant-sized scolding. Believe
me, you don’t want to be a student in this school unless you are fond of death, smiling at your face and saying, “Hasta La Vista, Baby!”

Unsaid social rules

For People Who Tend To Forget That Civility Is Free

Siddhi Mohanty, AIS Vasundhara 6, XII A

Forget not sneezing with mouth open, never answering back…it’s 2019, the do’s of social life have changed and so have the don’ts. Pouring ketchup directly on fries being one of them.
lDon’t play any video/audio openly in a public place. I know this is your favourite song, but it is not mine. So just don’t!
lDon’t scroll left or right when someone hands you their phone to show a picture. This is not my marriage album woman, give my phone back!
lDon’t forget to thank someone when they help you. Yeah, you’re in a hurry but I just picked up your stuff for you. Pick up your manners buddy, they fell down too.
lDon’t marinate yourself in perfume. Too much fiss-fiss a day, drives people away.
lDon’t use ‘k’ in a chat. I know time is money but if you’ve time to write ‘k’ you also have time to write ‘ok’.
lDon’t give spoilers of books/movies/TV series. No, I haven’t gotten that far yet, but thank you for disrupting the natural progression of the plot and rendering my entire reading experience up to this point utterly useless.
lDon’t make plans in front of someone you’re not going to invite. I get it that you’re going to your favourite cafe but don’t tell me if you’re not going to take me along. Come on, that’s not cool!