The 'R' day

Last Wednesday at 7.50 in the morning I was walking hurriedly towards bus stop for my office bus. It has become a routine and I have become used to the school around the corner,school bell that rings at 7.55 and same set of people who are on road for either their morning walk or to drop their children at school.Some people manage both things at the same time.What else could be the reason for fathers wearing track pant and sport shoes while mothers wear sport shoes that do not (at all) go with salwar kamiz?(I live in that part of Pune where majority of the crowd is Maharashtrian , married women wear saris or salwar kamiz and they still think married woman who wears jeans is either bold or agavu ). Coming back to the story :D ... So these days the road I take is not that crowded as it used to be one month back.Main reason for this is that summer has arrived and it's time for summer vacation( This explanation is for those who are single, graduated, doing job, have no younger siblings that go to school/college and have completely lost contact with educational field). So majority of the morning crowd has vanished and it is just me and some regular walkers these days.

However Wednesday morning was different. Many cars were parked out side the school (which were surprisingly clean?!how's that possible?? I find it very difficult to keep my 2 seater scooter clean.There are 2-3 incidences where little children in my building indirectly suggested me to clean my scooty by writing 'आता तरी धुवा ' on its seat cover. And it worked!I cleaned it not because of the thick layer of dust that had accumulated on it but out of shame.)Also there were lot many people present in the school premise than there could be on normal non-vacation day. Every one was looking damn serious. Parents wear that look almost everyday but surprisingly children were tensed too and it could be easily sensed. They were not smiling even when it was vacation time, they looked as if they hadn't slept for a while and children who were accompanied by both parents seemed unhappiest amongst the lot.School premise was not noisy but surprisingly silent. Now on normal occasion I would have approached anybody on the campus and would have soothed my inquisitive nature by asking questions but I was getting late for the bus and 'somebody' had warned me to be in the bus and save seats so I didn't stop. On my way I started thinking of all the possible reasons. Was the school principal dead and everyone came to pay their final respects? not possible..if it was true at least few faces would have seen smiling..was it a school trip? naahh.. then there would be happy screaming, chitchatting...... And suddenly my sarkari tube turned on!! It was 30th April.. End of April ...Which means it was time for result!!! Now that mystery was solved everything seemed so right.. the expressions, the anxiety.. worried parents..And unknowingly a smile appeared on my face..I was back into my school,high school and college days.

When I was in school, 'result day' never gave me cold feet, actually it used to be day of celebrations! As a kid I was a bright student and always used to score above 90%(I can actually sense some eyebrows raising but people this IS reality :) ). This was true till 4th standard and percentage did fall down to 75-80 when I switched my school and entered Dyan Prabodhini but there also I managed to be among top 6-7 students. At start of the year my parents would promise me a gift..conversation would go something like this..

papa: दीप्या, ह्या वेलेला जर तू 72 % score केलेस तर तूला तो ड्राइंग बोर्ड पाहिजे होता ना तो मिळेल
( ७०% was BIG thing in Dyanprabodhini.. I am not boasting ..But it was really very difficult to score 70..Highest would be of 78%.. It was CBSE school ..Now I am boasting :D )
me: Papa, तय पेक्षा आपण एक डील करुया, मी ८०% मिलवते तुम्ही माला साइकिल दया..


For first few years he hesitated to agree on this deal .. Later he realised that this was never going to be a reality till I was in DP so he used to say yes quickly..I never got that cycle..and always ended up with smaller gifts :( ...But still those were happy days. I fully enjoyed being called 'हुशार' student. I never understood why students (till their 9th std. ) take tension on the result day as it is nothing but summation of marks of all the exams that are conducted throughout the year.

Then came important years of my life (according to my parents..) 1oth and 12th .To be honest at the time of both the results I had butterflies in my stomach.Both the results were memorable.
10th's result was a surprise one.. not in terms of marks but the declaration itself!! As I have already said I belonged to Delhi board. 6 years back Internet was not fully spread like today and mobile phone was still an item to be possessed by rich people and not popular choice of communication.Every important news was conveyed through telephone and for that you needed to be present at home.We were waiting for the announcement of result date in news on tv.Everyday we used to discuss the 'probable date'. And one day when I was alone in my house my friend called me up and said the result was out. She had no idea about my score nor about hers but only thing she knew was that no one had flunked the exam(Duh!! stupid, give me the figures- was my reaction). For those who know me .. you guessed right.. by the time I hung up the phone I had anxiety attack!! I had just learned to ride my scooty.I took it out,rode it to find my mother who had went for purchasing groceries. On my way I almost hit a car and was going to slip on the corner.(Later I decided not to ride any vehicle when under tension for safety of other people who are out there on the road :D ).Luckily I found my mother in the first shop itself. When I told her the news she got excited (till date i dont know why).I parked my scooty in front of the shop.My mother stopped a riksha and litterally pushed me inside.When we reached school she stepped out of riksha before I could (seriously that was pretty quick for her age..) and we went in the room where list was displayed. I asked her to read out the result for me(this may sound foolish but I was too scared to see the result).When she did, she had a BIG smile on her face.Her second child had crossed first hurdle (10 th ka result :P) with flying colours!! hehe .. I still remember enjoying delicious dinner later in the night with my whole family round the table :) .That was one good day!!

This repeated again in 12th std. But this time dates were predeclared and frankly HSC board creates so much hype that you rarely get time to enjoy the success. The results are every where in paper, news channel and internet. There are constant phone calls of relatives (even those who you haven't seen for ages) asking how much you scored, what are the future plans blah blah blah .. But apart from that perks of scoring good marks are really tempting!! Actually that is the reason I used to study :) .I got around 8000/- (that too cash!!) in that year . I would have got more if i had been in the merit list :( ..Still those 8000/- is precious for me till date!

This success saga could have continued in my later eduacational years as well BUT I took admission to engineering(Do I have to elaborate more on this? :D ) Everything went upside down!! My father tried to repeat the similar conversation in engg. too but looking at my firt year result sheet he wisely took the decision of not wasting his valuable time. (You see..the reason of my degraded engineering marks is not ME but just because my father didnt put lucrative offers I lost the will to score :D ).Those 8 result days(4 engg. years of 2 semesters each ie 4*2=8 ..I didn't take 2 years to complete one engg year :D ..Just thought of clearing the doubt incase anybody wonders where 8 came from ) were most dreadful ones of my entire 'result day history'. Throughout the semester I used to do timepass and on the result day expected good grades to appear on my score card.. Hehe ..But I never regretted that.. It is true that T1T2 made my (actually not only mine but everyone's) life miserable at COEP and I am still thinking of taking the revenge on Ghotkar, Lehkar for wasting my valuable time by engaging really bakwas lectures but inspite of all this I really enjoyed the feeling i used to get on the result day!! I enjoyed standing in front of notice board and pushing people aside just to get glimpse of the result, I enjoyed informing my hostelite friends their result over the phone and I also enjoyed the discussions involving topic like 'Iwas expecting 'B' in Compilers but somehow got 'C', I am sure Lehkar didnt check the papers and just gave the grades blindly' that used to take place after seeing the result :) .
I really miss all that now.And it is strange that the tough time I had before and after announcement of result bring smile on my face now.But I guess this is what happens with every tough moment of our life.Once we cross that hurdle the path suddenly seems easy and enjoyable from other side of the road.