It is disappointing that the very people that inculcated values in us that till today make St. Marians a singular group can not realise what it means to have our faces removed off the hallowed halls. Still I am sure Father Everest would be more sympathetic to our cause if we approach him specially since he has been with us before Father Joe who apparently has not been with our school ever, had no inkling what it means to be sentimental about something. Here is something for you guys on the reunion. Enjoy.
"Mary’s Mary’s Mary’s ISC" echoed through the portals of Junior Assembly Hall as the Marians kept pouring in. Brought to mind one of our longest and most enduring poems The Pied Piper. (Robert Browning Remember ? ) And so to this unrelentless chant entered the Marians,
Big ones, small ones, grey ones bald ones,
Fathers with their sons and daughters,
Newly weds with the wives they honour
Short ones, tall ones, lean and brawny ones,
Some talked old times, some talked shop,
Others headed for the Kheema and Bunchop.
Different hairdos, Different styles,
Some played TT some played Giles
Some gave teachers a case of piles
Some were rebels some were coy
Whoever, Wherever, Whatever, Forever,
At the core, always, St Mary's Boys.
As we stood there looking disbelievingly at how some friends had changed in the ten years, we were all caught in a time warp that took each of us back several years. The school keeping up with the times now lit up by neon lights, ignited many memories as we slowly walked across the fields pointing to this place and that. " Hey that is where we used to eat our lunch, remember our marble spot where we played triangles, this is where we pulled so and so’s pants down., Aah I remember that goal"
A rough calculation tells me we spent about 17000 hours in school not counting the hours we lingered on after school. That justifies being emotional about it. No wonder then every corner came alive that evening , yanking memories out of our mental archives that we had long forgotten. Suddenly the restroom looked smaller than it used to be. The goal posts appeared closer. Why were the first two water fountains still not working ? We had to bend a lot more to drink out of them but the water tasted better than from the freshest alpine springs. Sigh! We’ve grown up.
Passing out of a Jesuit school it was odd that I should be one of the few Catholics in my batch. "Cha men" Mac was what we were frequently referred to. And we hit back with Sindhi Papad, Kanjoos Marwadi, and Mad Bawa. Yet through all the name calling there was no better breeding ground for National integration than here where we learned to respect each other for what we were and not where we came from and that led to the indomitable St Mary’s spirit.
As I drove out of school (I wish we could have taken the bus) that day I recalled the lines out of yet another poem King Arthur by Alfred Lord Tennyson
"The old order changeth yielding place to the new, and god fulfills himself in many ways, Lest one good custom should corrupt the the world"
And so each generation passes on (for the general betterment of all) and the same seats we warmed one year will be filled by another who I know in my heart will honour it the same way we did.
Nilesh Louzado