Impartiality & Fairness
Picture Credit: Daily News
By Dr. Tilak S. Fernando
This episode
consists of an incident experienced by a Cambrian (who now lives in
Singapore), while he was in the O/Level class, along with few other feedbacks, which go to show how school teachers in our era taught and entertained students
while being firm.
The first
story revolves on a particular teacher who taught us mathematics. His robust
masculine appearance, the streamlined moustache, hair combed backwards and
pasted to the pate with Brylcream resembled the Western heart throb, Clark
Gable in the film Gone with the Wind.
I could
remember him entering the classroom and going straight to the blackboard, drawing a figure, looking at the blackboard, while talking to the class stridently and then turning towards the class and
dictating questions for us to struggle with mathematical theorems.
It happened
to be a rainy day where not many students turned up for lessons. Consequently
he decided to inspect graph books of students and summoned the first boy to
come up with his book.
Period of doldrums
“Genave neha, Sir” (Forgot to bring ) was the boy’s
answer.
“Gedara palyan, gihin potha aran varen ”…..!. (Go home
and bring the book), the Master ordered.
So the first
boy left. Same happened to the second and third boys with equal measure.
Fortunately the fourth student had his book and he was asked to remain in the
classroom while the rest of the class watched until it came to his ( teacher's) own son’s
turn.
When the junior
approached the teacher (father) the same question was put to him:
“Ko umbe
potha”. (Where is your book….? ).
“Genave neha” (didn’t bring).
The teacher
suddenly flipped out and called the fourth boy (who was asked to stay back),
and in a silent aside said… “Lamaya umba duwala gihin ara gedara yana
lamainta apahu enne kiyapan”.(Child, quickly run and ask those children who
are going home to fetch their graph books to come back).
The happy
lot while returning to the classroom thought they would get a reprieve because
of the teacher’s son who was also in the same boat, but it was not to be.
He
commanded another boy: “Umba mage office ekata gihin mage vewela aran waren”
(go to my office and bring me the cane).
The ultimate
result was that everyone, except the one who had the book, received a spanking,
thus showing the impartiality and fairness displayed by a set of professional
teachers.
An old
Cambrian now writes referring to a particular Principal during whose tenure ‘the
college activities were allowed to go to doldrums, dictated by ( S……y) the peon, who was powerful and nick named as the 'Vice Principal’! Depressing indeed
it was, he recollects, even his predecessor, during the final stages of being
Principal of the College delegated the task of rubber stamping student reports
to the peon in preference to signing them personally.
Another old
boy who taught at the College for a short spell recalls a hilarious incident,
connected with the ‘peon narrative’. When a notice was circulated to
class teachers requesting to ‘forward student reports to the Principal for signature’
our mathematics teacher has taken the pun out of it by commenting: “The
reports must reach the peon for rubber stamping”.
Interesting characters
There were
so many Tamil teachers at one time at PWC, their names ending with ….. …segaram
to ………..sundaram and ……ratnam to ……. tanam,
who were teaching Science subjects. The famous …….ratnam who used to
walk, to some extent leaning to a side, was nicknamed and depicted in the
College Magazine in a cartoon as “The Leaning Tower of PWC!”
Another
Tamil master who taught Zoology suffered from a nasty coughing bouts. It rather
became a distraction, apart from spreading germs, when students became more
interested in recording the number of times he coughed during a 45 minute
period rather than concentrating on the lesson.
Another
respectable Zoology master …….. sundaram, whose hobby was photography,
hit the roof when a student had his name on display on the blackboard in big
capital letters with a prefix BALU ………. . He lost his cool so
much that Mr. Nobert Dias (deceased) had to cool him down saying, “after
all you are doing zoology………..” which was followed by laughter.
There were
two eminent drawing masters at PWC who were equally outstanding and had been
like part of the Prince of Wales College furniture. I can recall how my elder
brother (the late M .R. Fernando - Former Director of Highways) telling me how
he shared the office of one of these art masters (during his time) to have his
lunch.
The only
difference between the two drawing masters had been that one was fluent in
Sinhala, whereas the other one was a bit rusty. Once, the son of the master who
was proficient in Sinhala had drawn a picture of two cows (one without a tail)
grazing, and given a poetic caption in Sinhala to suit the drawing: "Gon
dedenek vel eliyake kaka uni" (Once upon a time there were two
cows grazing in a grass field).
The drawing
master who was not skilful in Sinhala had admired the drawing but could not
understand the poetic phrase that went with it. In the meanwhile an ebullient
teacher, who was eloquent in Sinhala, had quipped in a good-humoured manner; “that’s
meant for people like you”, which certainly had irked the other teacher in
no small measure, but could not do anything to his colleague whose sense of
humour was inimitable.
Looking at
the progress or the regress of the College, and going back to two-three decades,
the pulse of several old Cambrians felt today indicate that the reason why PWC
could not retain teachers of par excellence and veracity in the Upper School
was due to out-and-out mismanagement by the then Vice Principal, the famous
(or the infamous Brahamin!) bachelor who was always seen walking along the corridors
(on his heels) with feet wide apart as if to avoid obstructions on his way
and dangling his bunch of keys on his left palm. Whatever the obstacles
he may have foreseen right in front of him at that time, during his walks,
it appears now that he had been the cause for many a student to leave Prince of
Wales!
The general
consensus now coming out of some old boys is that if teachers of the calibre of
the late Messrs. A.P.M. Peiris or Norbert Dias had been the Vice Principal at
that time, the College would have gone to a better place far beyond!
- Daily News - Jun 2013