I just recollected about this, a day after Gurupurnima. As a kid, I was afraid of my teachers. There is nothing wrong in admitting. I was extremely afraid.
Taking beatings with a wooden scale, teachers, squeezing our ears, even using bamboo stick, seemed to be very embarassing and even more in front of entire class.
Once, I had forgotten to bring a notebook to the class. We had the concept of classwork and homework, notebooks, one for classroom writing and one for writing exercises at home. I had not brought one of the book. I was so scared, that I will be made to stand out of the class, that I wasted two hours pondering over it and when the class was over, I can recollect, the book was never needed. What a waste of time.
This might be the reason, I ended up carrying bucket loads of books to school, out of fear. (Might be, I am not sure, I cannot prove it, because I have forgotten about it).
As I approached high school, I can recollect, it became an obsession to carry lesser and lesser books to the class. Infact, we used to show each others' bags just to see whose carried more books. The fear just gradually came down and down as I grew with age.
One more instance I can recollect, I literally forgot to complete my homework on time, and was about to get a signed letter from my parents, saying I was out of town and was not able to complete homework on time. But luckily, I stayed back at home for some more time and completed the same.
I still wonder, why I was so afraid of my teachers. May be it brought discipline in me. But I feel, fear results in lesser self confidence.
And in my case, it might have resulted in losing bucket loads of time. May be I could have read another TinTin comic or a Famous Five book or something else,
And as I grew up, as the fear gradually came down and after which what happened, well.. thats another story.
Cheers,
Sandeep
