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10 Reasons Why You Shouldn't Go To The Mallinson School


10 Reasons Why You Shouldn't Go To The Mallinson School

Yes, this was the first post I wanted to write on my blog once my exams were over. Now that I am done with them, albeit not so greatly, I want to give a little vent to the bottled up feelings of mine about the so great, so exalted The Mallinson School, popularly known as Mallinson Girls’ School, Srinagar.

I wish someone else had written this on their blog, or anywhere for that matter, two years ago when I was thinking of enrolling myself at the said school. It could have saved my life. But, of course, we rarely get such saviours in our lives.

I don’t think that I can save many a lives by blabbering here on Sensible Scribbles, for not many will see this post before getting themselves an admission in the 10+2 department of Mallinson Girl’s School. But I hope that someday, at least one- just one person would read this and save her life by deciding against going to MGS. If I save that one life, I will feel that I have saved the humanity.

For all those people who went to the doomed school with me in the years 2011 and 2012, I am sure that most of you, if not all, will agree with what I am going to write here. If I made an effort penning it all down here, you too ought to do your part, girls. If you know anyone planning to study there at Mallinson in the coming sessions, save them. Tell them how you coped through the two years. Tell them what it is like to be a “Coerced” Mallinsonite for two whole goddamn years. Save a life. Spread this to the world.

Before I go to the points touching the caption, I would want to tell you why I joined the school:


1.  The name of the school was big. The top scorers came from Mallinson. Taking into consideration a few statistics of a couple of previous years, I thought that the Mallinson girls  get great marks in boards however they perform.

2.  I knew that the 10+2 department of Tyndale Biscoe (The Boys’ Wing of the Institution, together known as Tyndale Biscoe and Mallinson Educational Society) would never hold a class after twelve noon. At times the guys were out as early as ten thirty. Just three hours of school seemed a wonderful idea. Heavenly.


3.  I went to Kothibagh Goverment Girls Higher Secondary for a fortnight and was as frustrated with it as anyone could be. Loneliness, creepiness, the government school stereotypes at Kothibagh killed me. Mallinson had to be better than that. Absolutely!

4.  I was told I would learn a lot from the girls at Mallinson than I would learn from the Kothibagh peers.


5.  I’d quarrelled with the Mathematics teacher at Kothibagh (She was a woman! A married woman teaching Mathematic! IMAGINE!!!). I hated the sight of her. I didn’t want to spend a year seeing her face.


I was so, so glad the day I got myself enrolled at Mallinson Girls’ School. I was on my way to excellence. I was on my way to fulfil my dreams. But only if it were true.

Two years at MGS have given me the worst experiences of life. It taught me so much (through the bad that it inflicted upon me), and it took so much from me.
On the basis of these experiences, I give you this list. Ten Reasons Why You Shouldn’t Go To The Mallinson School....


  10)                                 Poor Infrastructure:

Yes, I was told this before that Mallinson is so primitive with respect to its infrastructure, but I thought it won’t matter at all. I was going there to study, not hanging out in the campus.
But trust me, sometimes the infrastructure is all you want to ease your pain, when you want a silent moment, an Only-Me moment. You won’t get any place to spend time with yourself because Mallinson doesn’t have any. Every place at the shrunken little campus is overcrowded all the time.
If that doesn’t seem a great thing to you, then I’ve got a bigger point to add. If I am to describe the 10+2 classrooms in one word, it would be WAREHOUSE. The classes are poorly ventilated, utterly, utterly small, with extremely uncomfortable seats and colours on the walls that you would only associate to that of Mental Asylums. A day in the class in enough to give you a depression for a lifetime.


  9)              Library (Can we call it that?):

The Mallinson Library is the worst place a book lover can go to. At first sight it would appear like a makeshift Hogwarts Dining Hall with just one row.
You can’t read the books you want to, in the library. They are all locked up.
Keeping the library books apart, if you get your own book and want to make use of your spare time by reading a little in the library, they won’t let you in. Because they goddamn won’t have the place to accommodate you.
I once asked the librarian to let me sit in some corner and study physics from the book that I had in my hand. I was told, “This is a school library. Not a public library that we would let any student in. We don’t have enough place here.”
The library is as small as you can imagine. It is just very small to be called one. Really very small. They call it “Champak Library” (after the children’s magazine Champak that they give the students to read)


  8)              Late Date-sheets:

You will have to write a billion exams at Mallinson. But that is not a problem until you get the datesheet in time, even if it is a week before exams. But no! That doesn’t happen. At Mallinson, or at Biscoe for that matter, you will get the schedule just a day before exam. For instance, if you have your exam on Monday, you’d get the calendar for exams on Saturday. Until that time, you won’t know a single thing with surety about your exams.

     
  7)              Loss of Identity:

It won’t take you more than a week to realise that you are a nobody at Mallinson. You aren’t acknowledged for your good, ever.
There’re only two ways you are remembered. One, being extra ordinarily obedient to the egoistic lot of teachers, and being extraordinarily disobedient to them. I respect the latter more.
Your marks are also a very important thing to get you a recognition (You have to be the class topper for that, else it doesn’t matter whether you’re the second highest scorer or second least scorer. You get the same respect). It doesn’t matter to the teachers if you’re the most genius girl in the class. You are the topper, you’re the best. You aren’t the topper, you’re nothing. Hell with your genius.


  6)              Inexperienced Staff:

Whether it be your mathematics teacher (woman, again!) who doesn’t know the trigonometric table, your chemistry teacher who prefers to say “Cathode Ion and Anode Ion ” rather than “Cation and Anion” because he doesn’t know how to pronounce these, or your English teacher who thinks “undoubtly” is a word in the real sense, explains “Bewilderment” as a synonym of “Amazement” and gives grammar examples with a horse in every sentence, you will find yourself surrounded with ignorance at the school. Every teacher is worse than the other and there is no scope of improvement because the even the preferred recruits are the ones who have some prior (read: retired) experience. Or by chance, if they recruit someone young, it just takes a fortnight for the newer ones to become like their older counterparts in behaviour and in intellect.

  5)              Partiality and Bias:

All the students are not the same in the eyes of the administration. If you are the one in their good books (having great marks, and showing ultra obedience) and you do any damn thing against the rules, you’re still saved. They’ll “Beta this shouldn’t happen again” you and forgive you. But if you’re not the topper and have a little life outside the slavery to the teachers, and you the same thing the topper did against rules, you’re dead. They’ll peel off your skin. Your parents will be called and you’ll be humiliated in every way possible to them. Even your parents are not spared.


  4)              Prehistoric Professors:

The teachers that you have would be a billion years old. There’re just a couple of Biology teachers who are below forty, who are equally bad, though. I being a Mathematics student didn’t have a biology teacher. But I never heard any good about them from the bio students ever.
You talk about experience with age, but had there not been anything wrong with aged people working, the government would not have been giving them a retirement. This bunch of teachers is absolutely impatient. Entirely contrary to what the behaviour of a teacher should be like.
They’d still behave the way they did with students back in the 1970’s or 1980’s. They need to understand that if you give respect, you will take respect. They do neither


  3)                                Bossy and Egoistic Administration:

The administration of the 10+2 department is held by the Professors. Lady Professors, to be precise- who don’t even know how to speak a proper sentence.  They won’t listen to you about anything. If you’re wrong, you’re absolutely wrong; and if you’re right, you’re still wrong. They won’t leave a moment to boss you around. Anybody who raises their voice for the right has to be crushed. Their worst fear is anybody posing a danger to their devilish unity. The female lot is worse than the male lot of teachers. It sometimes makes me believe that woman is not one of the best creations of God Almighty. Especially the egoistic women who teach. Your individuality, your honour, your respect doesn’t mean anything to them. All that matters is their supremacy- right or wrong.


  2)              Unfair Marking:

This is the thing I hate the most about the school. You work damn hard, you write your papers with so much of stress and in the end, you don’t even get half of what you deserve. And trust me, this is so dejecting when this happens to you personally.
You’d still study well, once, twice, but not more than that when you have been so consecutively marked badly despite studying so much. Working hard seems to fetch no results then.
I already told you the teachers are very, very old and they mark you the way they used to do in their times- when they were hotshot professors (Yeah, right! Hotshot! My foot!).


  1)               Nothing like three hours of school:

If you’re with the thoughts that you’d be spending three or so hours maximum at the school because the school is off very early, you need to rethink about it. The Biscoe guys may be out early but for Mallinson it is a completely different story. The difference between your last class getting off and that of the rest of the school would be a maximum of quarter an hour. So, it doesn’t make a difference whether you study there or anywhere else. And the torture is truly not worth that half an hour of early off.



Some of you might not be of the opinion that I have, but then we should agree to disagree on the fact that Mallinson Girls’ School’s Higher Secondary Wing is utterly useless and depressing.

Now if you ask me where one should do his schooling in the 10+2 if not at Mallinson (or Kothibagh, because I didn’t quite like it), I’d say nowhere. To be honest, I think Kashmir doesn’t provide any opportunities for students to grow in these two years of their life. I don’t think we really have any good schools for 10+2 in Kashmir. 

We seriously need a change in that respect. 

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Young And Old: A Poem By Charles Kingsley



Young and Old
When all the world is young, lad,
And all the trees are green;
And every goose a swan, lad,
And every lass a queen;
Then hey for boot and horse, lad,
And round the world away!
Young blood must have its course, lad,
And every dog his day.

When all the world is old, lad,
And all the trees are brown;
And all the sport is stale, lad,
And all the wheels run down;
Creep home, and take your place there,
The spent and maimed among;
God grant you find one face there,
You loved when all was young. 
By: Charles Kingsley

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Koshish Karne Walon Ki Haar Nahin Hoti


लहरों से डर कर नौका पार नहीं होती,
कोशिश करने वालों की कभी हार नहीं होती।
नन्हीं चींटी जब दाना लेकर चलती है,
चढ़ती दीवारों पर, सौ बार फिसलती है।
मन का विश्वास रगों में साहस भरता है,
चढ़कर गिरना, गिरकर चढ़ना न अखरता है।
आख़िर उसकी मेहनत बेकार नहीं होती,
कोशिश करने वालों की कभी हार नहीं होती।
डुबकियां सिंधु में गोताखोर लगाता है,
जा जा कर खाली हाथ लौटकर आता है।
मिलते नहीं सहज ही मोती गहरे पानी में,
बढ़ता दुगना उत्साह इसी हैरानी में।
मुट्ठी उसकी खाली हर बार नहीं होती,
कोशिश करने वालों की कभी हार नहीं होती।
असफलता एक चुनौती है, इसे स्वीकार करो,
क्या कमी रह गई, देखो और सुधार करो।
जब तक न सफल हो, नींद चैन को त्यागो तुम,
संघर्ष का मैदान छोड़ कर मत भागो तुम।
कुछ किये बिना ही जय जय कार नहीं होती,
कोशिश करने वालों की कभी हार नहीं होती।
-----हरिवंशराय बच्चन


Lehron se Darkar nauka par nahin hoti,
koshish karne walon ki haar nahin hoti
Nanhi cheenti jab daana lekar chalti hai,
chadhti deewaron par, sau bar phisalti hai.
Man ka vishwas ragon mein saahas bharta hai,
chadhkar girna, girkar chadhna na akharta hai.
Akhir uski mehnat bekar nahin hoti,
koshish karne walon ki haar nahin hoti.
Dubkiyan sindhu mein gotakhor lagata hai,
ja ja kar khali haath lautkar aata hai
Milte nahi sahaj hi moti gehre paani mein,
badhta dugna utsah isi hairani mein.
Muthi uski khali har bar nahin hoti,
koshish karne walon ki haar nahi hoti.
Asaflta ek chunauti hai, ise sweekar karo,
kya kami reh gayi, dekho aur sudhar karo.
Jab tak na safal ho, neend chain ko tyago tum,
Sangharsh ka maidan chhodkar mat bhago tum.
Kuch kiye bina hi jai jaikar nahin hoti,
koshish karne walon ki haar nahin hoti.

-----Harivanshrai Bachchan

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Don't


Don't make me fall in love tonight again,
As I sit here in the dark
Being awake, waiting for someone ,
Someone to come around, and talk.
I listen to the faintest of sounds
In the middle of this night
And my heart beats against my chest,
The weird feeling, I don’t know
If it’s wrong or right.
This time reminds me of the wind
That long ago had passed me by,
Leaving me shattered, all alone
To rot from within, to break, and to die.
Someone talks of night in the poetic lines,
And I want to be a poet too.
Talking of the night that makes me miss someone
I don’t want to think otherwise, but I hope it’s you.

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Bazeecha-e-Atfaal

This is not my own. It is Ghalib’s. Mirza Assadullah Khan Ghalib - the great Urdu poet. Heard of him? 
I like him a lot. He is my ultimate companion in the times of pain. 
Here is a part of his poetry I’d want to share with you, if only you would understand it! Ah!


Baazeechaa-e-atfaal hai duniya mere aage
Hota hai shab-o-roz tamaasha mere aage

Ik khel hai aurang-e-sulemaan mere nazdeek
Ik baat hai 'eijaz-e-maseeha mere aage

Juz naam naheen soorat-e-aalam mujhe manzoor
Juz waham naheen hastee-e-ashiya mere aage

Hota hai nihaan gard mein sehara mere hote
Ghisata hai jabeen khaak pe dariya mere aage

Mat pooch ke kya haal hai mera tere peeche
Tou dekh ke kya rang tera mere aagay

Sach kahte ho, khudbeen-o-khud_aaraa na kyon hoon?
Baitha hai but-e-aainaa_seemaa mere aage

Phir dekhiye andaaz-e-gul_afshaani-e-guftaar
Rakh de koee paimaanaa-o-sahba mere aage

Nafrat ka gumaan guzare hai, main rashk se guzaraa
Kyon kar kahoon, lo naam na uska mere aage

Imaan mujhe roke hai jo khinche hai mujhe kufr
Ka'aba mere peeche hai kaleesa mere aage

Aashiq hoon, pe maashooq_farebee hai mera kaam
Majnoon ko bura kehti hai Laila mere aage

Khush hote hain par wasl mein yon mar naheen jaate
Aayee shab-e-hijaraan ki tamanna mere aage

Hai mauj_zan ik qulzum-e-Khoon, kaash, yahee ho
Aata hai abhee dekhiye kya-kya mere aage

Go haath ko jumbish naheen aankhon mein to dam hai
Rehne do abhee saagar-o-meena mere aage

Ham_pesha-o-ham_masharb-o-ham_raaz hai mera
'Ghalib' ko bura kyon kaho achchaa mere aage!

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Be By My Bedside


How I wish you could save some time
To come to me, by my bedside.
Leaving the place where you aren’t supposed to be
Just to tell me, Baby you’ll be fine.
You’d keep your hand over my head
And tell me that the fever’s nearly down.
You’d take the book from my hand
And look at me lovingly, with that caring frown.
I wish you could stay, just a little longer
Or better never go at all.
You could talk me to sleep and Caress my forehead.
If the pain woke me up,
I’d see you and a smile would run through my face.
I’d be happy that you’re here, I would want nothing more
No longer would the world then make me grimace. 

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The 'Novel' Physics Class


I hate Newton - the father of physics
For his his research works,
And the hatred increases by double folds
When my physics teacher looks at a girl and smirks.
Teaching us the capacitors
Repeatedly his eyeglass falls;
If a girl stands for a moment in the class
He’ll push her out and yell that
“This stupid always strolls”.
His bass voice makes me want to puke
His grey beard and hair
Endlessly gives me creeps;
I pretend to be engrossed in the capacitors
Thinking “Reading fiction is a great stress buster
For the half an hour as it blithely sweeps.”

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Drizzling Morning


It drizzled as I got off the bus
In my hand the bag I clenched.
Hurriedly getting on the bridge
Worried, that I’d surely get drenched.

The rain touched my face
And I walked with my head held low.
Huge ripples forming on the green river water
Amazed me as I saw them from the bridge above.

Holding an umbrella, a girl walked a little away
And she sounded like my far off friend.
Another shrieked so loud as if
The world was about to end.

Getting wet in the rain, ahead of me
A guy run his fingers through his gelled hair
Looking at my watch, another school day stared at me
Screaming, the four hour torment was just ten minutes near. 

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