Here is the thing about going back to school after the best summer vacation in the history of summer vacations; you never want to! Everyone around you is bunking those evening swims and gully cricket sessions to go to uniform fittings and buy textbooks. But really, all you want is to stretch the days out like the rubber band from your sling and hope it doesn’t snap!
While I spent the larger part of today moping under the mango tree and avoiding Amma’s pleas to go shopping with her, I had long to think about this yearly dilemma. Is school more fun or the holidays; holidays are full of lazy plans and unexpected treats and school is full of strict bedtimes and homework. But Sasha seemed really happy today while she got into the car with her father. She even waved me bye cheerily! So is there more fun to this going back to school pain than I thought there is?
Two hours, one stubby pencil and a several discarded bits of paper later, I had a list of pros and cons for myself. If one has to make up their mind about something, they might as well do it thoroughly!
Summer Vacations!
The pros of summer vacations seem infinite, one can laze and be free. There are no schedules and alarms clanging in your ears. The most complicated decisions revolve around: whether one should eat another mango or not. The summer visits from Ammamma and all the frantic travelling whenever Amma and Appa get leave from work and seeing all the cousin monkeys and raising ruckus around the house. All the ice cream, oh the ice cream! The gully cricket, swimming, summer camps and evenings spent in spirited games in the park all make me feel like summers are the best time to be alive in!
How could I forget? Sleepovers are the essence of the best summers; begging Raju’s amma to let us have the attic to enact the fall of the evil Doncantor Monster with our curtain capes and carrot shotguns! A school night would never allow for destroying evil and having a healthy snack past bedtime.
The cons however loom over me too! With all this fun to be had, there are some things that trouble me. Amma loves “together time” with the family and I love it too. But summers mean so much together time!! Plus all the fun with my friends keeps falling through because they are always travelling and when they want to play, it’s me that is travelling. Summer vacations mean a lot of time, and when I say a lot of time, I mean right from the early morning walks and swimming sessions to the late night escapades and sleepovers! But I have to admit, with so much time on my hands I’m bored so often! I am only one little kid! How many things I can come up with!
School Days!
There is something to be said for the perks of school time too! School means not having to plan much! All these grown-ups plan so much, the only thing I have to do is turn up where they want me. Skating classes, The Little Gym classes, homework, birthday parties, play dates. They even plan nap time my nap time!
One definite perk of school time is being at school! The first three weeks are always tough, waking up early, that dreadful glass of milk I have to pinch my nose and gulp before chasing the school bus like my Bruno chases cars. But once I used to it, it is a lot of fun too! For one, I get to see my friends everyday and sit next to my best friend in class too. Lunch breaks are spent buffet-style with all the boxes open and hungry hands reaching into all with equal haste. School bus rides are full of the silliest games we can make up and although we would never admit it to Ms D’Souza we love her class, she does make mathematics fun!
Before I get carried away and admit I love school time, I do remember that school time means homework and tests. The most fearsome of them all; the exam! Even curtain capes and carrot shotguns can do nothing about the worry that looms over us all during exams.
To be completely honest, after a thorough examination of both the perks and downfalls of both summer and school time, I realize that I like and dislike them both in equal measure. One thing I do know, I love being a kid!
By Nikita Bandale – Trainer, TLG India
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