In 2015 Yangchenphug Higher
Secondary School is celebrating its golden jubilee. This premier public school
has served the nation with distinction to realise the vision of its founder,
late His Majesty, the third king of Bhutan. I have had the honour of spending
two years of my academic life at the school, thereby sharing a common identity with
a myriad of illustrious alumnae and alumni, many of whom have served or
continue to serve our nation with excellence.
As the extended Yangchenphug
family comes together to celebrate and rejoice, I would like to share some of
my experiences from the momentous two years at the then Yangchenphug Central
School (YCS). These reminiscences and reflections are divided into various sections,
beginning with my arrival in the spring of 1983 – the year of the water pig, to
my departure in 1985.
Arrival – the country mouse arrives in the city
Pema Gatshel in eastern
Bhutan to Thimphu, the capital city of Bhutan in the west, is a long drive even
today. I completed my class eight from Pema Gatshel Junior High School in
December 1982. By February 1983, the results of the All Bhutan Class VIII Common
Examinations were out. As per the instructions of the Department of Education,
I was to continue my schooling at YCS. The department of education was then
implementing the policy of the government, aimed at integrating the society
through cross-cultural communion of various ethnic groups. As part of the
policy, students from the south were sent to boarding schools in the north and
west, whereas students from the east and west were sent to schools in the
south. Thanks to this noble policy of the government, today we have senior
public servants who are quite well versed in local languages and cross cultural
practices.
I arrived in Thimphu in the first
week of March 1983. The journey from Phuentsholing to the capital city took
more than seven hours in a long-nosed Tata bus, which proclaimed ‘goods are at owner’s risks’. A Royal Body Guard personnel hailing from my
village, who was travelling with me from Phuentsholing, took me along to his
quarters above Tashichho Dzong. I spent the night at his place and he dropped
me to the school the following day.
Admission: the country mouse is accepted
One of the memories from my first
few days at YCS was meeting the then Principal Mr. K George Ipe, a south Indian
thoroughbred. He was very unlike the headmaster at my previous school, who wore
simple trousers to work and lungi and sarong at home. Mr. Ipe, by contrast
presented himself as chairmen of multinational companies would do today, replete
with three-piece suits and the dignity and poise of slow measured speaking.
My first encounter with Mr. Ipe
was in the dining hall on my first day at school. Perhaps he was fascinated by
the midget of a new-faced boy – for he pointed at me and motioned me to come
over. I trod over to him. By then a burly hulk of a boy was standing beside Mr.
Ipe. He looked at the two of us and asked basic questions.
‘Which class are you in?, he asked
me. ‘Nine, sir’, I replied. He faced Dorji and asked him, ‘and you?’ ‘Seven’, he answered. The way Mr. Ipe reacted
at that time became a popular repartee throughout my two years stay at YCS.
‘You look too small for class nine’, he told me and looking at Dorji and with
his hands crisscrossed in his inimitable style, added, ‘and you look too big for
seven..’. Dorji is as big today as I first met him and I am probably as small as
Mr. Ipe saw me that day. I think both Dorji and I stopped growing that evening!
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| A rare group picture - with Homnath, Bhawani and Santiram |
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| Some of my good YCS friends continued to Sherubtse, where this picture was taken - with Basant, Madan, Shah, late Omnath and Karna |
Hostel life – better comfort than home
Like all schools in Bhutan YCS divided its
students into four houses. However, at YCS the houses had rather unique names; it
was not red, yellow, green and blue or a combination of the eight lucky signs
as was common those days. The students were rather divided into Tiger, Bear,
Leopard and Yak – all worthy animals, yet I could never understand the genesis
of the house names. I was assigned to Tiger House. The student hostel and
dormitories were divided by house and the dormitory for class eight and nine
students of Tiger House was on the northwest wing of the monastery of a hostel.
Today, the hostel is converted into classrooms and my son studies in one of the
rooms, which used to serve as the dormitory for class seven students those
days.
Each house had a house captain and
a housemaster. Mr. R.S Subba, the jovial geography teacher was the housemaster
while Mr. Rinzin Dorji was the house captain when I was in class nine. Kaka
Tshering, who later became the principal of the school, was the house captain
when I was in class ten. Kaka was a fine house captain and I developed good friendly relations with him, which continue to this day. Each house was allotted a plot of land and every
Wednesday and Saturday, students had to do socially useful productive work,
which was mostly agriculture in house plots. When I was in class 10, Tiger
House made the highest earning from the sale proceeds of the house farm and Mr.
Subba rewarded us with a big steel plate each.
With its strict regimen, including
physical training and relatively good and balanced diet, hostel life in YCS was
good. I came from a rather poor family and student life in Pema Gatshel had
been meagre. At Pema Gatshel we slept on flea infested wooden floors and had
very basic food, including porridge made of tiny black-elephant infested flour.
YCS, by contrast, was five star – we were served fried rice or fried wheat
bulgar for breakfast, rice with curry, ema
datshi and daal for lunch and
rice with curry, daal and meat/egg
for dinner. In between, we received tea/milk with biscuits and nimki twice a day. Students also
received beddings, school uniform, shoes, soap and other basic necessities for
free. I have benefitted from the largesse of the Royal Government and remain
indebted to the generosity of His Majesty, our 4th king.
Every morning, students were taken
on runs and walks. I remember dreading the shrill sound of whistles from the
school captains and the PT Master. We used to group by house and go for long
walks/runs – mostly towards and beyond the then India House, cross Thimchhu at
Dechen Zam, towards Sabji Bazar,
before completing a circle at the school gate. If the house captain was
generous, he would allow us to change into walk at the school gate, else we had
to huff and puff to the hostel in full trudge.
Teachers – overall competent, some wily
At YCS I was taught by very
competitive and remarkable teachers. Mr. Subba would take us to the basketball
court for his geography lessons. There he would draw lines on the court, place
students at various points and illustrate lessons on latitude, longitude and
time differences as we moved from east to west. Mr. A. K Sarkar, a moody, yet
extremely talented Bengali, was my English teacher in class nine. When a
student asked him the meaning of a word, he would close his eyes and rattle at
least five synonyms and a few antonyms. One time, one of us asked him the
meaning of variegated. He immediately closed his eyes, raised his voice and
recited, ‘variegated, colourful, multicoloured, parti-colored, kaleidoscopic, …. He
encouraged us to read comic books when he was in no mood to discuss King
Arthur’s Excalibur. It was from Mr. Sarkar that I picked up the habit of reading
Tinkle and Archie comics.
Mr. R B Rai’s lessons were as
immaculate as his façade. He taught us Maths and did so with a sense of purpose
and diligence. Years later, I met him as a parent at Druk School where he
taught my son. I believe he is still around in Thimphu. Mr. John M Chiramal
taught me Physics and Chemistry. He had such a beautiful handwriting that many
students improved their writings by simply copying him. An Anglo-Indian, John
was a very versatile teacher and was capable of teaching any subject, except
Dzongkha. He was a very modern teacher and socialized with the students, even
eating with us in the dining hall. At a time when power gap between teachers and
taught was huge, John was a revelation. John still lives in Thimphu. Mr. P C
Roy was a gentleman historian and loved repeating the Cuban Missile Crisis of
1962. The incident was still fresh then and Mr. Roy enjoyed enthralling his students
with his creepy story telling techniques. Mrs. Aurora taught us economics and the
subtleties of demand and supply. She was a quiet lady with a light smile
omnipresent on her face. Mr. Pereira taught us English in class 10. He was a Sri
Lankan UN volunteer and was more interested in socializing than teaching. He
would invite us to his house and treat us to tea, coffee and biscuits.
Dr. Joshi taught us Biology. He
was a bit hard of hearing and used to get irritated by his own fallibility. It
was under Dr. Joshi’s tutelage that I learnt how to dissect fruit and fish. I
also learnt that apple was a false fruit as it was but an overgrown thalamus. Lopen
Jambay Dodo (may his simple soul rest in peace) was the only Bhutanese teacher
and taught us Dzongkha. He was a bit fuddy-duddy. More than teaching, he was
renowned for scaring and frightening students. He didn’t bother much about
students learning the national language and always gave good grades as long as students
wrote neat and long answers loaded with honorifics and respectful words. He was
famous for regularly scoring his favourite students 105 marks out of 100!
I was a reticent student and kept
working hard to keep up with my classmates, most of whom were long time YCS
students having been in the school since their primary classes. When I first
arrived in YCS, I and other freshers from remote schools had experienced some
sort of ragging from veteran YCS students. My Dzongkha was poor, their English
was perhaps superior - so the old
students would pick on us and tease us. However, things settled down pretty
quickly and before long all of us were YCS students. One day in class nine,
Principal Mr. Ipe brought along a group of visiting Englishmen to the class. We
were studying English. Mr. Ipe pointed at me and asked me to read out the poem,
‘Lochinvar’ by Sir Walter Scott. I must have read out the poem loud and clear –
the tourists as well as Mr. Ipe smiled at me and thanked me when I was done.
Apple hunting – the boys venture out
An apple a day keeps the doctors
away. Probably YCS boarders understood this adage better than anyone else. Come
August every year, hostelers would wake up in the middle of the night or in the wee hours of the morning and fan out in different directions. The previous
weekend, students would have scouted and located the best apple orchards and
the best fruit; they knew where exactly golden apples were and where they could
find the Royal Red variety. They also knew where entrances to the various
orchards were and where a chowkidar slept, if there was one. August and
September were heavy fruit season in the hostel. When we woke up in the
morning, we would find a couple of freshly plucked apples placed by our
pillows. Our thieving Samaritans always shared their booties. I never went on
an apple hunting expedition/mission myself. No, it was not moral high ground or
ethical clarity – it was a result of strategic partnership. I had a large green
Chinese rucksack and I had struck a deal with my thief friends – they would
take my bag and in return I would get 25% of the pilferage. It worked out so well that I never learnt how
to steal apples while fending off loud barking Tibetan Mastiffs.
2nd May was a big occasion at YCS.
Every year the school organised a roaring fete on this day. In those days,
there were not many fetes, fairs or melas and the YCS one attracted more than
50% of Thimphu’s population. GREF and IMTRAT participated and helped the school
set up the various tents and pavilions. Indeed GREF personnel would come to the
ground a day before the fete and cook and prepare their delicacies for the
fete. The school didn’t serve us lunch on the day of the fete and students were
compensated with money coupons worth Nu. 15 for use at the fete. However, most
of the students would finish their coupons the evening before the fete feasting
on Jalebees and
other delicacies. On the actual fete day, we landed up scouting for any relative
among the crowd of visitors to emotionally blackmail him/her of Nu. 10 or 20. When I
was in class 10, one of my best friends Diwakar and I set up a game stall ‘kill
the rat’. It was a seemingly simple, yet complicated trick. A ping-pong ball would
be sent down a short and narrow pipe and a player had to hit it with a mallet
when it landed on the wooded base. Many people came and tried their luck the
whole day, but except for a rustic looking native no one managed to touch the
ball. We handed over the neat amount we had made to the school authorities.
The Bridge – so near yet so far
What is now the RSTA office and the bus terminal
in Thimphu used to be known as ‘the
bridge’ to YCS students. There was a long row of shops including one owned
and run by Mrs. RB Rai. Making a trip to the bridge was an adventure in itself.
First thing first – you needed some money for the trip to be eventful. However,
with or without money, with or without purpose, for no rhyme or reason students
visited the bridge. Some went to the bridge to buy basic needs; others went accompanying
those who had money hoping to receive a bubble gum or chugo in return. It was
at the bridge that many of my friends picked up drinking, smoking and chewing
tobacco, while they were still wet behind their ears. A couple of my friends
who first tasted alcohol and tobacco at the bridge went on to become big time and
successful addicts eventually succumbing to their habits later in life. Mrs. RB
Rai was a kind lady (I meet her to this day and she is still the same kind
woman!) and always offered us a free chewing gum or a piece of chugo. Access to the bridge was,
however, limited as students were allowed to visit it only during weekends.
Exit from YCS – the half city mouse departs
In 1985 Bhutan was yet to
establish its own examination and assessment system and we followed the Indian standards.
In the spring of 1985, I wrote my Indian Council for Secondary Education
examination. Unfortunately I fell grievously ill a few days before the exams
started. I had been feeling groggy for about a week when malady struck me
on schedule for the examinations. Mr. Ipe came to me and suggested that I forgo
the exams and reappear the following year.
I suggested to him that I be allowed to write – if I write and fail, I
will have to reappear, if I don’t write at all, I will have to reappear. So,
please allow me to write, I implored. An examiner was arranged for me and I
wrote my class 10 exams from my sickbed in the hostel. When results were announced three months later, I had scored enough to qualify for Sherubtse, the
only school that offered higher secondary (class 11 and 12) those days. I still
had the option of repeating and purportedly improving my results, but I chose
to move on. YCS had been very kind to me for two years and I didn’t want to
burden it any further. I left YCS at the end of March 1985.
It is March 2015 and three decades
since I left YCS in 1985. My elder son has recently completed his class 10 from
Druk School, Thimphu. Based on his results and his own interest, he is seeking
admission in class 11 at YHS. I enter the newly constructed gate, park my car
at one of the two parking lots and lead my son to the auditorium. The willow
trees and the old auditorium seemed to recognize me. After completing my son’s
admission formalities I take him around the campus. I show him my classroom and
we climb up to the erstwhile girls hostel, which now houses classrooms and
offices. Many things appear friendly, yet many things look alien. The canvas is
the same, but the picture has changed, perhaps faded. I feel proud, I feel
nostalgic and I feel happy that my son is back to continue from where I had
left 30 years ago.
I wish my alma mater a happy birthday and many
happy returns of the day. As a school song goes, 'i give to you, you give to me...', I owe to you, YCS, and perhaps, you owe to me, as I
continue to try my best to serve our great country with dedication and integrity!
