I have been drafted as observer for the SSC examinations. This new responsibility has given me an opportunity to visit the examination centers and verify the arrangements as well as the examination in progress. Looking at the boys and girls, immersed in their Q and A papers, trying to give their best made me think about the days I was a 10th standard student. My 10th standard was from the Central Board of Secondary Education. Those days the 10th question paper covered the syllabus from both 9th and 10th standards. I was not a brilliant student. In fact I had a morbid fear of Mathematics and would have most certainly flunked the exam if not for our gracious Physics teacher Ms Krishnaswamy Iyer. She consented to teach me Mathematics just a few weeks before the exam and guided me with some stock problems, tricks, and shortcut methods. As luck would have it I memorized a few formulae , learnt a few strategies especially in Mensuration, Geometry, Trigonometry, Percentages and Proportions and scored 90 out of 150 in Mathematics: exactly 60%. We also had a practical exam in 10th standard and I came out successful in the Physics practical with the topic, The Laws of Reflection. As Physics teacher Ma’am was there for us explaining difficult topics like Light, Sound, Electricity and Magnetism. ( I got news recently that Madam passed away after turning 90). As I ruminate, I feel I would have definitely been detained in my 10th Std if not for my Physics teacher who made me believe in myself and restored my confidence.
The subject which none of us had expected to fail but some of my class mates did fail in was Social science. I scraped through this subject with 57 marks out of 150. The school mean score was only 54. My SSC total was 470 out of 750 which is 64%. Not a bad score during those days (1983) but it did not make my Dad proud. Coming to the days of the exam, our board exams were in the afternoon session and the center was St John’s Higher Secondary school in Mandaveli. We , the hostel mates would board a city bus and return to the hostel after the exam. Oh! The exultation and elation after the last exam. Even a simple meal late in the night in the hostel with rice and curried egg tasted divine. We trooped to see two back to back movies after the exams ended : Escape to Victory just like the lot of us and the 36th chamber of Shaolin. Part of the romance if I could call it so about your first board exam is the excitement and the thrill about what lies ahead. It is also the relief that comes from having crossed a great divide after months of preparation ,anxiety and wait.
The sweet aromas of jasmines, coffee and coriander powder being roasted, wafting from the bylanes of Mylapore which did strike me while I was writing the exam are still fresh in my memory more than the definitions and formulas. Secondary school was a time of innocence when what mattered most were friendship and play. Then the world would let you have time for yourself as what was to come would be out of bounds.