Remembering my school days

Have been thinking to write this for some time. A rare personal article on this blog. Since I left Trivandrum for Chennai in search of job, I had seldom visited the places where I grew up. During one of my recent visits to Trivandrum, I took time to visit the places I studied. Below are some pictures of places which shaped my early days.

Vishwabharati Nursery School, Karamana, Trivandrum

My early schooling started at Vishwabharati Nursery School opposite to where we used to stay in Karamana. I am surprised to see that it has not changed after so many years. It has been more than 30 years since I walked out of this school. I might have studied pre-KG and LKG here.

After my time here, I was moved to one of the best schools in Trivandrum at that time, Chinmaya Vidyalaya, Vazhuthacaud. It was one of the first schools started by Chinmaya Mission in 1969. Since the school was away from my home, there was a taxi which dropped us to school every day. During this time, I got to meet Swamy Chinmayananda who was a frequent visitor to the school. He used to spent good time with the students. I still remember him reaching us how to do magic with a coin. He is one of the early influences in my life to show how divinity would be using his calming presence. I studied here till my 6th standard. At that time this school was only having lower primary classes and hence I had to move out.

Govt. Girls High School, Karamana, Trivandrum

Govt. Boys High School, Karamana, Trivandrum

My next school was Government High School, Karamana. Walkable from my home, this school was on the banks for Karamana River, one of the major rivers flowing through Trivandrum. Both boys and girls high school were on the same campus and shared a common playground. Boys school had a good building and Girls school was having building only for class 10. Other classes were held in bamboo sheds with coconut leaf thatched roof.

Me having studied in English medium joined the Girls school since Boys school had only Malayalam medium. The school had one division for every class as co-ed with English as a medium. I studied here from 7th to 10th (SSLC). Most of my fond memories about school life are during this time. I was an average student who didn't hog any limelight during my school days.

Karamana River

During out past time, other than playing games of football, cricket, kabaddi etc, we used to go fishing in the river. There was only a wall separating the school from the river and whenever water rises in the river we used to get holiday.

We had a fairly big ground shared by Boys and Girls schools. The ground was in the same condition now as it was at that time. It was a fine example of gender harmony. I was in the Cricket, Football and Kabaddi team during this time. This is where I studied cycling using my friend's BSA SLR cycle. I used to rent cycle in the nearby shop and roam around here during weekends.

After finishing 10th, I studied Pre-degree course (10+2 at school was introduced later) at Mahatma Gandhi College, Trivandrum.  I will save that for another post.

Sankara Subbaiyer Lower Primary School, Karamana where my brothers had their primary education.