THE only time my father slapped me was when I was five for being a smart-mouth. My friends and I were having dinner and I did not find the food particularly palatable.
My father looked at the leftover food on my plate and asked, “do you know that millions of children go hungry in India every night”? I said I did not.
He said, “well, they do, so you better finish your food”.
So I asked him what I thought was a completely sensible question – how it would help the starving children in India if I finished my food.
My friends started laughing as my father did not have an answer so he slapped me.
When he left, I asked my friends if I did something wrong.
And they said I did. I had questioned my father. That lesson has stayed with me all my life not that I should not question my father or a higher authority, but why I should not question if it did not make any sense.
Buddha said, “do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. Do not believe in traditions because they have been handed down for many generations. Do not believe in anything because it is spoken and rumored by many. Do not believe in anything because it is found written in your religious books. Do not believe in anything merely on the authority of your teachers and elders. But after observation and analysis, when you find that anything agrees with reason, and is conducive to the benefit of one and all, then accept it and live up to it”.
If you look at Buddha’s statement in an objective and unbiased manner, it makes a lot of sense. So why is it so difficult for people of embrace a simple commonsense way of life? Why are we so willing to give up commonsense just to be politically correct?
If I questioned my teachers, I was told that I was being a nuisance. So I lost interest in studies and consequently became a very mediocre student.
I was always distracted. I would put a book on my lap and read if I found the class boring which was most of the time.
My father thought I was too dumb to pass my from six (Year 12) exam so he asked a priest to come and put some wisdom into my thick skull.
A priest came and uttered some mumbo-jumbo for what seemed like an eternity, then he asked my father to bring a bowl of hot water and dipped a matchstick in it.
He asked me to take my tongue out and wrote some hieroglyphics on my tongue.
Then he put his hand on my head and made this solemn pronouncement, “all the wisdom of the universe in now in you and you do not have to worry about failing”.
I looked in the mirror to see if there was a halo around my head but did not see any. I figured that I was not wise enough yet and that the halo might appear when I slept.
I flunked so badly in the exam, but in a manner of speaking the priest was right – I did not worry about the failure at all.
In college, I was forced to take subjects I hated. I had to listen to my father as he was paying the tuition.
And I ended up with Zoology as my major. There is a small species of shark known as Scoliodon Sorrakowah (I am surprised that I still recall the name of this wretched creature. I suppose unpleasant memories are indelibly etched in our brains).
Whenever the assignment was to perform a dissection to expose the cranial nerve of the shark, I always questioned how it would be of value to me in real life. This was a cue for my professor to kick me out of the class.
This was a mutually beneficial arrangement. He did not want me in the class and I did not want to be in it.
So while my classmates struggled with looking for the 7th cranial nerve (or was it the 9th), I delighted in reading the thought-provoking essays of G.K Chesterton or laughed myself silly with the very British humor of P.G Wodehouse.
I felt that the seven years that I taught at Cuvu Secondary School were the most fulfilling years of my career.
Plutarch said, “the mind is not a vessel to be filled, but a fire to be kindled”.
And I did my best to instill critical thinking skills in students, taught them how to think rather than fill their minds with worthless data.
I got poor performance reviews from the inspectors from the education department. who came to assess how we taught.
The only inspector who liked my teaching was the late Filipe Bole who wanted me to join the staff members at QVS or RKS. But
I had promised the principal that I was going to stay and make Cuvu High a school to be reckoned with.
Which I did. And was richly rewarded for it – I was terminated for being a renegade. I guess no good deed goes unpunished. My wife was also terminated – her fault being that she was my wife. I put my termination letter on the notice board – it was my badge of honor.
“To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson. And I have had some degree of success in doing it my way.
I am still a renegade. I relish the wisdom of Buddha and have tried to pass it to my children and grandchildren. I am happy that two of my daughters are activists in their own ways – questioning what does not make sense – much to the angst of the conventional thinkers who are too stuck in their irrational beliefs and to my great delight.
- ARVIND MANI is a former teacher who is passionate about quality education. He lived in the US for 35 years and was actively involved in training youths to improve their speaking skills. The views expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views of this newspaper. He can be reached at theinspiredteacher9@ gmail.com
