Childrens’ Day 2014

Monthi Serrao celebrates with Calcutta's sandesh

Today was the 125th birth anniversary of Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime minister of Independent India. It was also Children’s Day – something we can relate to better. For at the Garden, we are all overgrown kids, unwittingly reliving our childhood every morning. And to celebrate this unique feat, Monthi Serrao brought us Bengal’s famous sandesh, fresh from a reputed sweet shop in Calcutta. Her daughter was there on a recent visit and had thoughtfully brought back this prized, mouth-melting specialty for us.
The kindergarten atmosphere we have created for ourselves in the Club is clear to any follower of this blog.

It is the ladies' turn to bully Arun Patil

None of us would be caught dead outside the Garden behaving half as childishly as we do inside. For instance, Arun Patil can never dream of acting like a classroom bully the way he does in the Garden. Today, he got on the wrong side of the ladies, correcting them at every step during the exercises. Fed up, Mallika Kagzi complained to the 'teacher', Yusuf Rassiwala (who was in the middle) about how Arun has a problem with everything she does. “The next time he dare opens his mouth, I will stuff it with a big luddoo,” she threatened.
Mallika is not the first one to protest and surely, not the last. Razia Khan has been Arun’s favorite sparring partner for long and now his sights are on two new ladies who have joined for the past two weeks. “Save your walking for after the exercises,” he told them today. “You've got to be punctual here!” At the other extreme, we have the Club’s perennial Peter Pan for whom anything goes. Shekhawat just does not care about discipline and rules, so long as everybody has a good time. In between, there’s Srichand Arora who cannot make up his mind whether he is the ‘headmaster’ or a ‘class monitor’. And then there are the pathological chatterboxes – Razia Khan, Bhaswati Bose, Kajal Babani, Monthi Serrao, Santosh Tyagi, Mallika Kagzi…
On Childrens’ Day, the blog salutes all these ladies and gentlemen who forgot to grow up.
Bhaswati Bose:
Very Good, Very Good, Ye!
Jagmohan Papneja:
Every person has a child hidden inside. Mallika Kagzi and Arun Patil are allowing it to come out and play.
Harish Wadhwa:
Beautifully worded blog today. It is the child in us that keeps us young at heart and jolly. We all know that physical age has caught up on us and this is irreversible. Monthi-ji, one student did not get the sandesh (and I am not referring to its literal meaning of a 'message'). Teachers are supposed to treat all 'children' alike -- more importantly, on Childrens' Day.