Rewinding

At last it is over - my son and d-i-l systematically goading Ashwin and Rohan to study for their annual 8th and 4th grade exams. With both keen to devote more time than they do to coach despite office commitments, and Aunty busy with household chores, I feared the axe would fall on me to teach the 8th grader Mathematics. Fortunately Aunty, who knows me inside out, volunteered to help him. A providential escape.

That took me to the ‘good’ old days.  I was basking on the touch-no-books-whatsoever days after my Matriculation examination. Suddenly my grandmother sprang a surprise. “Sundaram, I have given word to my friend that you would coach her grandson, studying in the 7th class. He has not been faring well in studies.”  As if I was. I reluctantly relented.

The coaching sessions took off admirably.  Subjects such as Social Studies, Science, did not pose me a problem. With the book in hand I could check when the Battle of Panipat was fought, or that water is made up of 2 hydrogen molecules and 1oxygen molecule. But in mathematics I had to negotiate my way to the answer myself, and then pray it tallied with the answer printed on the last page of the text. Sometimes it did.  In my case often it didn’t. 

Just one instance, in strict confidence. Unable to make much headway in a particular mathematical problem, I tried to help the boy. The answer I got was Rs 10.00, but the answer printed at the back was Rs.10.50. I made several attempts to get that figure. Meanwhile, to give a semblance of activity upstairs where I was teaching, I asked the boy to read aloud a lesson from the English textbook. That would reassure his grandma downstairs, fixing a mega-tumbler coffee for me, that her grandson was in safe hands, after all. 

When all my efforts failed to lead me to the figure, Rs. 10.50, I pronounced my verdict to the boy: “In such cases, you should add on your own 50 paise to the answer arrived at.” And the poor boy obeyed. In the next problem the answer tallied on its own, but the unsuspecting boy added 50 paise there too. “Who asked you to add in this instance? I told you only in the ones like the last,” I asserted. 

This went on for a few months.  Then one day my uncle from Delhi came on vacation. It was the practice in those days that when seniors came on leave they would take with them whosoever in the family had been readied to take up a job in the city. It was my turn then. 

Accordingly, at the next class I bade farewell to the boy and his grandma. Taken  aback,  she asked me, “How could you? My grandson has just begun to show improvement.” “Like what, Patti?” I asked, rather surprised. “In the quarterly exam he got zero in Maths, but in the half-yearly term he scored 17.” “Thank God,” I said, my guilt partly erased.  

On reflection, I hope to come out unscathed in the final dispensation of justice, on three counts. One, the lady was happy over her return on investment. Two, I was on the last leg of my adolescence, and was perhaps entitled to a farewell naughty act. Three, between then and now I have visited Varanasi several times, no matter some of them on duty travel, and I never missed a dip in the Ganges on any occasion. That should wash off my sins for a good measure. 

18 July 2018