Teacher's Day

The 5th Septemeber morning started with trying, failing (read: not doing well enough!), and again trying ... ! Yes, I was trying to put a gift-wrapper around a small gift that my daughter was to present to the class teacher. There was time pressure. She had to report to school by 7:25 AM. And I forgot to do the job assigned to me previous evening. Unpardonable! I deserved the guilty-look that I wore on my face till I finished the job.

But I felt really bad to see one health drink advertizement on television while doing that job. In the advt., one child complains that her mother provides her 'cheaper' health drink which compromises her growth, and not the costlier brand that was there in the advertizement. And the child thinks that the mother is guilty when it falters in any competition as if that health drink would have brought a winner! Mother is our first teacher. To put up a child against the mother to jack up sale of one product is simply ominous.

'Shraddhaban labhate Jnanam' - one who respects, learns. Once we lose respect, we cease to learn. We learn from everybody. We learn from even non-living things. There is a famous poem in Bengali by Sunirmal Roy,  titled 'Sabar ami chhatro' (I am student of everyone) where he says,
(my poor translation) "Sky taught me openness / Wind taught me incessant work / Mountain taught me to be graceful and silent / Sun told me to be brave / Moon taught me to be sweet / Ocean taught to nourish pearl of thoughts at bottom of our heart / River taught to move ahead, unmoved  ....

In the evening attended the function at our lab., mock presentation for high value project from the Dept. (to give would-be presenters a feedback), and the function at Netaji Auditorium put up by Radhakrishnan Hall of IIT Kharagpur, in that order. Could watch a beautiful play and listen to speech made by a student (youtube link).

And of course, sent and received lots of messages.