“You never let me be by myself” was a common complain I had of my mom. Back then , when I was 14 and when my hormones had hijacked my brain I always made statements like, “ It is such a pain to be born as the only child in a mediocre family , that too as a daughter.” Adolescence is when one makes damaging statements like that.
Wait! Not to blame my hormones alone. It was also due to the fact that my friends had access to things that I did not have access to. For example, when all my friends had a happy sleep over at Navya’s place, I had to stay back home tossing and turning with strong emotions on my cosy bed cursing my mother who lay beside snoring like a wild bear.
The harder I tried convincing my mother to let me hang out with my friends, the harder I got screwed. Her usual responses were :
“You will go once you score as much as your friends do” or
“Your friends have irresponsible parents” or
“You cannot miss your music classes for the sake of fooling around with fools like you.” ………….. ……. etc.
But this time I had planned something different and all I waited for was for my exams to get over.
No sooner the vacation set in, it began, my melodrama! Regular hunger strikes, long silent treatments, not bathing , refusing to go out and play…..etc. . Nothing bogged down my military mothers will. It was not until when my posh uncle came that she let me go. She began with her usual
“How will she manage alone?”
“She does not know to braid her hair”
“It is now that she has learnt to eat by herself.”…..etc.
Nothing worked on my uncle who was too desperate to get his daughter a company.
Within the next half an hour my luggage was packed and we were set to go in my uncle’s flashy car to his villa. Little did I notice those moist eyes, filled with tears and hope that her overprotected baby would return soon.
It was 3 hours of journey and we had stopped thrice at places where I got to eat all junk in the world that a mother would never approve.” Wow! It was this uncle whose wavelength matched mine.” I thought. No sooner we reached his white washed castle like villa, my sister welcomed me with a warm cuddle and a worker escorted me to my sister’s room. I went to the washroom to fresh up and accidentally turned on the shower instead of the water tap. I was wet from top to bottom.
“How dare you enjoy alone?” screamed my sister and we danced in the shower with some soap bubble games. We made utmost use of our mother’s absence.
Later in the evening we ate a delicious meal which my mom could never afford. Then in the night we saw a movie on home theatre and it was the first time I was experiencing something like that. My sister had wrapped me nail colours imported from the US in origami sheets of pink and lavender to gift it to me. My joy reached its zenith when uncle announced that we would go to the water park the next day. So we went to bed soon to wake up early.
In the middle of the night I could feel an acute headache which progressed later to heaviness. Unable to sleep I searched for a balm and could not find one. It was then that I began to miss my mother and realised that I had not dried my hair after the shower dance. Yet I refused to acknowledge my feeling of missing my mother and fell asleep in the midst of my thoughts.
When I woke up I was surrounded by an uncle that was anxious, a sister that was half guilty and half sorry and a doctor who was reading the thermometer through the spectacles on his nose. I had a fever of 102 and apparently I had fallen off the bed chanting my mother’s name !
No sooner I got up to explain our shower dance, there came running a mother with some Desi Nuskas for her BABY!!!

We know that the concept of education is quiet broad and comprehensive. It is an essential medium for leading the life of human beings. It is the process of bringing up the child in all spheres of life.
Swami Vivekananda has a different say on it. He defines education as the manifestation of divine perfection already existing in man. He observed that education is a medium by which character is informed, strength of the mind is increased and the intellect is expanded so that one can stand on his own feet.
According to him we must have life building man making assimilation of ideas. If education is identical with information, the libraries are the greatest sages and encyclopaedias are the greatest rishis.
He believes that knowledge resides within an individual and education helps to realise it. His ideas and principles of education has Vedanta as foundation.
The role of a teacher according to Swami Vivekananda is that of a philosopher, facilitator, mother/ father, model to the child, a sage who renounces or brings out what is there in the students mind and trains the potentials to get best results.
Thus he attaches great importance to the personal life and character of the teacher. Swami Vivekananda was himself a good teacher and had the practical experience as a classroom teacher.
Establishment of Ramakrishna Mission Ashramas is a remarkable contribution by him. These educational institutions are spreading his ideals all over the world. Thus, he is rightly called as the practical saint of modern India.

Thanks for joining me!

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton