THE TWO TEACHERS

THE TWO TEACHERS

I was almost ready to call it a day after a weary conundrum of cases with the promise of a dinner and a good night sleep with my loved ones when the mobile rang an unfamiliar tone. I dismissed it as one of my obsessive patient seeking reassurance on a simple matter, when its insistence compelled me to answer and I was in for a greater surprise. It was my old buddy of my school years yearning to have a chat over dinner.

I requested him to come to my clinic where we could chit-chat with no holds barred and laugh to our heart’s content and then decide on the dinner. I send all my staff earlier as we would certainly end up with some sexy anecdotes and I would not like to embarrass them though I knew those were the ones they really expected to gloss over and recall with bliss later.

He was in my clinic within no time and already over a cool drink he embarked on a nostalgic tirade on the memory of our school days wrought with ever remembering negative ,but interesting experiences.

After sometime he softened and we ended up on the various nick names with which we berated our classmates and our respectful teachers. There were singularly two nick names that made the rounds among our classmates which we never forgot to recall every time we met.

One was ‘The snuff’ teacher and another was ‘The dirty word ‘teacher. I always make it a point to tell about the ‘Snuff teacher and he wound up remembering the other one

The “snuff ‘ teacher was a frail thin dark ,Sir ,very aloof , serious almost an introvert, but going about his job with gusto. He had a nasty habit of putting snuff inside his nose. More than the snuff it was the camouflaged act that caught our attention and gave it a charm and a halo. It was a sought of a ritual for him. He would bring the snuff, in a customized very small wooden box , open it ,pick it in a jiffy ,take a bit between his fingers ,and as he dragged the chair he would snuff it in his nose turning towards the board and then smear the remaining on the chair grip. Then he would entirely launch on the intricacies of the history lesson and there was no one who could beat him in it. The teacher who came next would invariable ask if the previous class was the history class after he touched the chair grip.

Once ,before he could snuff it ,he was called to the office and one naughty guy sitting in the front row , scrapped the table top with the blade and filled the wooden box with the scrapings. The teacher returned to carry upon his blissful act and when the snuff hit his nostrils he could feel and notice the sting it produced . He turned to screw his eyes and mouth , while everyone in the class was stifling their smiles and laughter. He walked out without any reaction and being a man with a lot of self esteem he never brought the wooden box again to give a chance for the students to replicate. Probably someone in the class had informed him but he did not complain at all. We came to know later that he would use the stuff outside before entering the class and hide his wooden box” I finished with lot of remorse as I was the naughty boy.

"Oh ! don’t feel bad , my friend ,let me recall about the teacher nicknamed “the dirty word”. I smiled as it was an interesting one which produced peals of laughter in all of us.

He was a happy go lucky teacher and he was as good as any in the English language. He also had a nasty habit. He would not tolerate anyone telling bad words. If anyone complained, he would reprimand the student and in the ensuing anger he would use all the vulgar words possible, especially in the vernacular . We all wound up closing our ears and laughing. He would also laugh it off and then teach exemplary English.

After sometime we took turns to complain so that our names were remembered and recalled . In his next period he would call our names and ensure to ask the student sitting nearby if we were indulging again in telling bad words and when the boy nods his head in the negative ,he would be happy . But then another student by lots would be ready to complain and it would regale us all in the beginning of his period. All the students would happily wait for his period and the attendance was always full. “Because of the early incident with the ‘Snuff” teacher I did not do any prank with this teacher”. I reminded him.

Then I narrated a surprise event which he did not know.” Several years later I saw the English teacher standing in the queue of the ENT Dept. and I introduced myself as a student of the school. “He asked my name and when I told him he did not remember it” I recalled . He had come for a throat problem. I took him to the ENT Professor and had all the investigation done and finally the Professor diagnosed it as a chronic infection and there was nothing wrong with him. As I happily lead him out ,he stopped to enquire about my name again. .Before I could say he asked me “Do you tell bad words in the class?” When I nodded in the negative he said “That is the reason I don’t remember your name. After I told my name ,he happily laughed and left the premises.

“Those two teachers were the best we had and the most memorable” I summed up ,the laughter echoing the room.