Musings of a returned Indian-1

May 2009 officially ushered in four years of us having returned to India after a longish stint in the US, 14 years for my husband and 10 for me, for those who are curious - and everyone is - the moment I say that we returned from the US, most people (especially people visiting from the US) ask "How long were you there?", because you see, the length of your stay determines how the rest of the conversation will go, and how much "NRIness" they should attribute to you - Did we acquire US citizenship? Did we buy and sell a house there? Were our children born there? All three of them? And how old were the kids when we returned? (yes, yes, yes, yes and 3, .5 and .5 respectively).

But I digress. I stumbled across some blogs and articles about returning to India today and began to ruminate about my own experiences. When we first returned, I blogged about my experiences for a year or so - some of those posts really embarass me when I read them now, but I've left the blog stay, because so many people have written telling me they've found it useful. Many of the things I seem obsessed about then (supermarkets, pediatricians etc.) seem fairly trivial now - I have settled on a good ped, I know my way around my favourite supermarkets etc. etc. Some of the other stuff I wrote about earlier are still very important to me - grappling with servants, my general disgust with our run down cities and lack of civic services and so on.

I'll focus this post on my #1 pet topic nowadays - schools.

Schools, of course, predominate my life nowadays - my oldest is now a 2nd standard student and the twins are in their 3rd year of Montessori (a real Montessori school unlike the many doppelgangers in India, but yes, they do dole out pages of homework every day - the pressure of the 1st standard entrance exam looms). I am, frankly, not very enamoured of schools here. I don't have much to compare with - D and I went to Grad School in the US, and our oldest was in a daycare when we left. But comparisons apart, most Indian schools are still where they were in our zamaana - teaching by the rote, tons of homework and exams and tests, students and parents having to be ultra-respectful, almost servile to undeserving, underpaid teachers, and so on.

My experience getting my oldest into grade school deserves a whole another post. Suffice to say that entrance in most schools is still arbitrary, based on entrance exams which can be easily bypassed by making overt or covert "donations". I deliberately steered clear of the so-called international schools - where money is the altar at which the staff worships, where prominence is given to the A/Cs littering the classrooms rather than the English-speaking ability of the teachers, where...suffice to say, international schools are not my cup of filter coffee.


Anyways, my oldest secured a seat at "The" public school of Hyderabad, sans donations, with merit - it is my husband's alma mater, so said husband was naturally overjoyed. Overall, my experience with the school in the last two years has been mixed - the teachers are great, but management sucks, the grounds are out of this world but the toilets stink, the academic pressure is quite minimal but learning by rote is very real and so on. The teachers are currently striking, by the way - demanding pay on par with the 6th Commission recommendation, which management initially agreed to pay but is refusing to do now. So my dear son is lolling around at home, getting royally frustrated. Many friends make not-so-polite enquiries about the state of the strike, and pepper conversations with "I told you so's" - they had warned me liberally about not putting him in the school.

In the meanwhile, precious time is being lost - time when my son could have learnt huge amounts of stuff in an environment where staff and management are not warring. That is the sad part of all this - that the student seems to be the very last concern of all parties in this squalid row.

So I can't help having an ocassional thought (maybe 1 in 50 thoughts, but it is still there) - what if Ani had been in, say, the Head Start school in Pleasanton, or the new elementary school in Dublin Hills, and was actually learning about the way things work? In this one respect, yes, we were probably better off in the US.

More about other aspects in coming posts.

P.S: The enforced vacation was not a total washout for Ani - he has managed to read books 2-5 of the Harry Potter series in these weeks. Not bad for a boy whose first milk tooth is yet to fall (he turned 7 in July), eh?

I had an argument with my brother yesterday about the educational system in India. There's no doubt that it is messed up and needs fixing. But S (my brother) believes in replacing the current "exam factories" with Valley School-type places where children learn at their own pace and are allowed to use their imagination (cue in Spongebob creating a rainbow and saying the word here).

There are several flaws in this theory in my opinion -

The "imagination" brigade is based on the principle that every child is a superstar at something. While I agree that every child is special, the cold, hard truth is that most children, and by extension, most adults, are average - average students, average shopkeepers, office workers, data entry clerks, stewardesses or even captains of industry. And does the "imagination" school prepare a child in leading a productive, yet average life?

I say no. Schools like Valley may be good for kids from elite backgrounds who can afford to learn arithmetic and reading at their own pace, while they paint watercolors and skip stones in the pristine lake next to the campus. But most kids go to grimy schools in urban (or rural) neighbourhoods - the toilets are dirty, kids sit on rickety benches or concrete floors, teachers are underpaid or undereducated (or both), classrooms are overcrowded ovens in the summer and chilly cages in the winter. I ask, where is the scope for imagination in this context? Can children really be educated at their own pace in such environments?

It is simply not possible.

Second, again, if you pass out of the imagination schools with a board certificate, you most likely will join an elite college where your tryst with imagination continues - an elite college where humanities are treasured, where you can discuss current events and history with inspiring teachers, and your peer group consists of people from similarly elite backgrounds. Or, you may yet join the BE/MBBS grind for a few years and then escape to the clean, green environs and "open your mind" educational atmospheres of graduate schools abroad.

But this sort of education is something beyond the grasp of most Indians. We should really think, and think hard, before removing, say, the Class 10 board exam. What is the benefit of this? That children have one less board exam to face among 20 others? Well, how about this laundry list for starters, before we go about slashing board exams -

1) Airy classrooms with clean toilets for ALL children in the country. Period.
2) Hot, cooked, mid-day meals for ALL children in the country.
3) No donations, no building funds, no capitation fees. A cap on annual fees.
4) Hire well educated teachers at decent salaries in ALL schools - not just central board urban schools.
5) Educational loans at low interest rates for education starting from LKG.
6) Compulsory sports/outdoor hour every day.
7) A single extra-curricular activity compulsory every day.
8) Strengthen the public/government school system, bring it on par with private schools. Then make it possible for children to attend the public school nearest their house.


Do all this first. Then think of slashing exams.

Letters - The F.D.A. and Engineered Food - NYTimes.com

Letters - The F.D.A. and Engineered Food - NYTimes.com: "“Coming to a Plate Near You” (editorial, Oct. 4):
We agree with you that the Food and Drug Administration’s proposed regulation of genetically engineered animals is more rigorous than its regulation of genetically engineered crops or cloned animals. Unfortunately, however, the F.D.A. will not be"

Letters - The F.D.A. and Engineered Food - NYTimes.com

Letters - The F.D.A. and Engineered Food - NYTimes.com: "“Coming to a Plate Near You” (editorial, Oct. 4):
We agree with you that the Food and Drug Administration’s proposed regulation of genetically engineered animals is more rigorous than its regulation of genetically engineered crops or cloned animals. Unfortunately, however, the F.D.A. will not be"

Ramayan Reloaded

I was delighted to stumble upon Virgin Comics' effort to give a post-modern twist to our epics. Check out

It is out of this world!

I'm an aristocrat

My Peculiar Aristocratic Title is: Baroness Paddy the Evanescent of Bumswick by the Hole Get your Peculiar Aristocratic Title

Media musings

I've decided to stop reading news-bytes about Britney Spears, her kids, her ex and her career (or what's left of it). I used to like some of her songs (come on, they were addictive!), and rather liked her too. Then came all the hoopla about marriage #1, #2, the "reality" show, her bizarre life, the poor kids, the divorce, the overexposure....right now, I just feel sorry for her. And the only way I can help her is by shutting her out. One less reader for the yellow tabloids.

Watched OSO yet? I haven't, and have heard/read widely divergent reports about it. I want to watch it at least once and judge for myself. I usually enjoy SRK's movies, except for that stupid KKHH - even KHNH wasn't so bad. Let me correct myself, KANK was the worst of the lot. So OK, I like SRK if he's not in a KJ movie! :) My brother is convinced SRK and KJ are a "couple", I highly doubt it. But even if they are, who cares? I enjoy SRK the product, and that's it.

Kiddie birthday parties and return gifts

When a kid goes to a friend's birthday party, they get a "goody bag" or a "return gift", as it's known here. This week, we have 4 birthday parties to attend. We've probably attended around 10 others so far this academic year (since June). The number is only set to increase, since the twins have started school now as well.

Due to this huge number of parties and the resultant return gifts, our house is flooded with writing boxes (what we used to call pencil boxes in the good ol' days), pencils, erasers, pouches, sharpeners, crayons, geegaws that light up when you throw them/stick them to the wall/press them, lunch bags, fake cameras, ping-pong sets, yo-yos....you get the idea - all the plastic thingies found in General Bazar for Rs 50 or below have made their way home, and we have everything times three.

As a result, my kids have absolutely no value for pencils, crayons, sketch pen sets and the like - things I used to treasure when I was a kid. They just use them for a day or two and throw them around. Every once in a while, they remember the "thing", whatever it is, and fight for it (they get 3 identical of everything, so ownership is difficult to prove).

And every kid in Ani's circle has a cupboard overflowing with jigsaw puzzles, activity books, sketch pen and paint sets, remote-controlled cars, "thinking" VCDs - i.e., learning to spell/do speed math/speak well/identify all the different dinosaurs etc. etc. So what do you gift such a child? I inevitably give them a story book, and hope they read it and don't throw it somewhere (or don't already own 3 copies of it).

God knows how many millions of houses this is being repeated across the country and the world...

Can some brave soul propose a "gift-free" birthday party and get away with it? We're far, far away from such a concept here in India, at least in Hyderabad - where people want to show their wealth/generosity/love for their kid/ability to overload party menu with 3 sweets, 3 fried savories and 2 drinks, besides the cake, candy, wafers and return gifts.

We went to a party of a little girl a few weeks ago (5th birthday) attended by over 200 people, which was completely outsourced to an event management company - food (a buffet of Italian, South Indian, North Indian and Chaat offerings), drinks, appetizers, conducting the games, return gifts - everything was taken care off. The proud mom was just wandering around here and there saying "hi" and "bye". This was the second time I'd met her, the first was when she came to school to invite everyone - the little girl comes to school with her ayah and driver everyday. They probably spent a lakh or two on that party. Each of my brood of 3 got about 4 return gifts in that party - photo albums, pencil boxes, a huge fake sunflower and the like.

The little girl came to today's party with her ayah and driver as well. Guess mom has outsourced attending parties, as well as hosting them.