Even the teachers have changed

I was studying throughout the way to my college. My exam was supposed to start at 3:00. There were still 45 minutes left. My parents dropped me at the college and I completed my revision with my friend. We lost track of time and there were just 8–10 minutes left to strike three. We immediately rushed to our respective rooms. I was the last one to enter. It had been an year but I still couldn’t recognise the faces of my class-fellows. I was trying to find my seat, the teacher on duty asked to keep my bag in front and take my seat. I decided to do that first and find my seat later on. I put my bag on the corner of a chair new the podium, so that with a little support I could stuff the books in my bag. There was an umbrella and a sling bag on it already, but the corner was enough to put my bag for few seconds. I didn’t realise the stuff belonged to that teacher-in-charge in our room. I put my books and placed my bag on the floor near the wall. The moment I turned back to move towards my seat that teacher said to me, “if anything got stollen from it, I will blame you.” Those words echoed through my ears. Was she saying that to me? No she ain’t. Then I looked where she was pointing to. It was the stuff on the chair. Yes, she was talking to me. In those few seconds I experienced a whole of thoughts running through my mind. The whole class looked at me with puzzled look. Things were happening so fast in that moment, I thought maybe I put my bag on a teacher’s chair, that’s why she was saying that. But she is a teacher and though I am not her class student but I am a student of this college. We are supposed to respect every teacher whether they teach us or not. I put all those thoughts aside and apologised to her by keeping my head down and saying,”sorry” I took my seat because all the class pointed me my seat. Tears were building up in my eyes. But that was not the time to cry. My mother had fought with the whole family to let me continue my studies. I knew what my mother went through. I took a hold of myself and filled in my particulars. The teacher was still looking at me. It felt like she was still suspicious of me. What the other students were thinking of the whole incident. Did they all think that I might have stollen something from there that’s why the teacher pointed me out. I thought she must be having a bad day or it was because I was the last went to enter but there was still 10 minutes left. I started my paper but couldn’t stop myself thinking about the incident that had happened. I was writing really slow. I panicked at the first question. I had learnt it but the answer couldn’t cross my mind. But then again, I gathered myself and started again. During the exam, whenever the teacher looked at me, I used to give her a faint smile. I wanted to make her believe that I didn’t anything wrong. I know I did wrong by putting my bag on a teacher’s chair but then if I think on the other hand, she is a human and I am a human and she was watching herself that I was just putting my books in my bag. I could’t have stollen anything in that half minute. Nevertheless, a teacher is supposed to have trust on a student.

Another incident happened after that. She was telling us how to fill in particulars that are left. A girl told her that the other teacher in the last exam didn’t tell us to fill this. And what the teacher replied shocked me.” Those are not teachers, those are housewives” she said. But the girl told her she was the lady to whom we submitted admission forms.” Yeah,yeah I know those ladies are from clerical staff” the Teacher told her. I knew they were from clerical staff but they were educated enough to explain how to fill in our front sheet otherwise the university could not have appointed them. For a second, I wanted to tell her that madam, they are not just housewives, they are home-makers. They work and do their household works too. But I decided not to because this teacher could be my subject teacher next year. I didn’t want to start on bad terms. But one day I will confront her about this situation and will ask her why did she say that to me and why she called them housewives. Does being a housewife mean that the person in ill literate? Couldn’t she just have asked me never to touch teacher’s chair? Or not to take support of it even for few seconds? With this I went on to write my paper because I had my mother who was counting on my to shut the mouth of the people who were against my studies.