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What Grandma taught me - a heartwarming story of how Grandma learnt English and proved that nothing is Impossible.
What Grandma taught me – a heartwarming story of how Grandma learnt English and proved that nothing is Impossible.
It happened when I was eight. As a ritual grandma Krishnaveni, Veni (that’s what Gramps lovingly called her) walked me to and from the bus-stop where I boarded my school-bus. We loved these walks that wove themselves with so many stories. We shared an Aristotle and Plato like bonding.
One day, she read aloud the red writing on a patch of whitewashed wall behind the bus-stop, with difficulty. It read –
To become an expert in English
visit
Brain-Tree-Classes
Address: 101, Madinaguda
Next to JNTU X-Roads
Hyderabad.
Ph: 36495 60920
Since that day, she kept looking at the words like a vampire craving blood.
One evening she re-read that sign for a few minutes and dragged me along a couple of blocks to the address from the graffiti.
It is not for old people like you. You should pass 10th class to join here.
The lean guy chewing pan at the front desk asked a few initial questions and arrogantly said, “It is not for old people like you. You should pass 10th class to join here.”
He chewed on his pan a few times and asked, “Do you even know the English alphabet?” He bared his pan-stained teeth at his own joke.
She’s not old. She’s only 51, I thought.
Granma’s face turned red as we zoomed out of the office. I couldn’t decipher if it was from humiliation or outrage. She cursed his backward thinking all along our journey home and said, “Idiot. Amul listen, never stop learning and never let anyone make you believe something is impossible.”
Since then I observed her spend a lot of time watching TV, especially the English channels.
In three months, she spoke English fluently. Of course she had a thick accent, doubly-rolled her Rs, her Ms were yums and zero was a geero.
Nevertheless, when I asked her how she did it, she said, “I initially bought three books – Tagore’s Gitanjali, English-English and English-Telugu dictionaries. I first memorised the passages from Gitanjali. Then recalled each word from memory and looked up its meaning in the dictionaries. Made notes and listened to people talk on English TV channels.”
“Wasn’t it difficult to read English?”
“I went to school until I got married at 13.”
Oh yeah, she read the graffiti with difficulty. I recalled.
“How many books did you read?
“Eighteen books in three months.”
That day, I pressed the delete button on the word ‘Impossible’ from my dictionary.
That was my dear journal on what I said in the two minutes allotted to me at the International student orientation. I gave the audience a little taste of home – My India which they never see or hear about in our media driven world.
Journal Entry dated: 12th September 2004.
University of Saskatchewan
Canada.
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UP Boards Topper Prachi Nigam was trolled on social media for her facial hair; our obsession with appearance is harsh on young minds.
Prachi Nigam’s photo has been doing the rounds on social media for the right reasons. Well, scratch that- I wish the above statement were true. This 15-year-old girl should ideally be revelling in her spectacular achievement of scoring a whopping 98.05% and topping her tenth-grade boards. But oddly enough, along with her marks, it’s something else that garners more attention – her facial hair.
While the trolls are driving themselves giddy by mocking this girl who hasn’t even completed her school yet, the ones who are taking her side are going one step ahead – they are sharing her photoshopped pictures, sans the facial hair, looking nothing less than a celebrity with captions saying – “Prachi Nigam, ten years later”.
Doctors have already diagnosed her with PCOD in their comments, based on photographic evidence. While we have names for people shamed for their weight – body shaming, for their skin colour- racism, for their age- age shaming, for being a female- sexism, this category of shaming where one faces criticism for their appearance has no name. With that, it also has zero shame attached to it.
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