Rambling Reminiscence

I visited my alma mater today. The words of Nelson Mandela, ‘There is nothing like returning to a place that remains unchanged to find the ways in which you yourself have altered,’ resonate with me during each of my visits there. Our tip-ex graffiti has long since faded, many of our old teachers have moved on to less blue pastures, but somewhere among those ancient walls and rickety floors, there is a sense of home. I really wished I had all my old friends with me to share in that feeling.

During my six month stint as an English teacher there last year, I was so uneasy about sitting in the staff room, among some of my old teachers, I spent my breaks instead with the tea lady, Aunty Esther (Allah yr7mha). I’m afraid that as time pools on my recalcitrant soul, I’ll forget my time there. There’s so much I don’t want to forget, I have to write about it sometime, I will write about it sometime…Not today, because today, more than that sense of home, the kids, their unabashed delight in seeing me, their humbling affection, the boys, growing up now, uncertain about whether they should hug me, even the hell raisers among them, ever so polite- I can’t stop smiling. Even though there were many days last year, that they made me scream and shout till I was hoarse.
————————————————————————————————

50 posts today, being an avid sports fan, I’d like to raise my bat to the oodles of free time last December that had me create a blogger account, the drama in January that had me posting a couple of times, only to leave the blog to its own devices to find people to look at it, then to Safiyyah, for starting a blog, encouraging me to start one, inadvertently reminding me that I actually did have one, sweet Don, for finding my blog within minutes of me chatting to Safiyyah, and mailing me questioning my motive in blog murder, Karolia for introducing me to blog culture, to my first commentators, Crimson Shimmer, MJ, Saaleha and Nooj, and to the friendships that have sprung from here- — I salute you, mes amis.