My Lovely Summer Days
Our joy knew no bounds when two boys pulled out two long sticks perched in the water from both sides. “Hurrah! Each bate had got a fish!”
Everybody was surprised to see the device of fishing tackles with just two long sticks with attached hanging strings. Both sticks were tied to a long string, and ten more strings were hung with it. Each string got bate and dipped in the water simultaneously, just like a badminton net on the ground. The sticks were pushed into the soft bottom of the water. This improvised device did the trick. All the faces lit with joy and we had had a lot of fish. After about half an hour we repeated the device one after another and filled our satchels. How exciting was the activity that everyone wished to pull out the sticks one by one? “We have never caught so many fish before.” Their joy knew no bounds.
Every summer would bring many excitements for us with it and we used to fulfil our cherished desires every summer. As David Daiches waited for his summer vacation in his early childhood. (Ref. “End of Term”) Picking up the fruits that fell from the trees in the graveyard was one of the most exciting and competitive sports in those days. Whenever the sky was over cost with dark and creamy clouds we would rush to the graveyard where trees of Jamobolin and mangoes were waiting for us in abundance. We were unable to jump the trees, so we couldn’t help picking the fallen fruit from the grassy land. We would throw stones and sticks at the bunch of fruit and could hardly get the ripe fruit. Ever wished to fill his shopping bags to fill up. Once my dearest uncle caught sight of me in that wretched condition of mine and censored me politely, and I stopped going there to pick the fruit again. On our way home I always stopped and stood watching the puppies clustered around the family to avoid the nip of the cold after raining.
My love for Puppies was great than any other object, but my mom never let them keep them in the home. So I fulfilled my desire just outside of the house. I could only keep rabbits at home. I used to keep them by the side of my bed on a summer night. I had had many hens and built a cemented shelter for them. However, it was not as safe as I thought because once or twice the cats had their delicious meal with my hens. Once it happened that one of the hens was caught up. She cried with a pang, “Alas! My hen has eaten up the cat!”; and when I told her that was not hers she got much relieved. made my grandma worried. She was mistaken that her hen was caught. The scene I saw at night was very horrible to me. A big black cat was over the chest of my grandma and she was crying while the other one was struggling to get the hen from the cage.
There was another very exciting sport that we all enthusiastically used to enjoy during the summer rains. We tore the pages from our notes books and tuned them into paper boats. These paper boats were very fragile. We used them in the flowing competition. Nobody could win because of the fragility of the papers. However, the hurling and yelling gave us no time to think about the miserable condition of the world. Time was fun for us. We did what we liked. We went wherever we wanted to go. We sat where we wished to.
At present, I think that the time is the same but I hear and see so much misery all around. The same would have been there in the past but we were quite a way from such unpleasant circumstances. Same the children are enjoying their fun and they don’t have so many worries as their elders have. Why does it happen?
Swimming and fishing took up most of our time in childhood. We got out hair cut short so that it would dry soon and helped us to tell a lie. But my Mom checked my shorts to feel its moist. We would go bathing on farms nearby in the little pool of water pumps that were used to water the rice planting seasons in July. When we had made up our minds to do an activity, we would do it if we had to crawl. We didn’t care if it was a foggy day in January or it was a hot day in June. The only thing that we were scared of was leaches in the ponds when we had to stand in the water to catch the fish.
Playing with colourful crystal marbles was one of my favourite sports in those days. The Blue and green colours of the marbles attracted us the most. I had a good collection of marbles, postal stamps, and portraits of flying jets. Becoming a fighter pilot was one of my most cherished dreams in life. It couldn’t be materialized just because of my education and lack of guidance. This is the only recollection of my childhood that still remained throughout my life, and after passing many years the fighter pilots attracted me more than anything else. I love to see and paint pictures of jumbo jets and other F-16s. Later I tried to motivate my nephews to fulfil my unfulfilled desire and I was permanently disappointed. Sometimes, I consider my failure on the score of my innocent enjoyment.
There was another bad activity that we did on the summer nights. We attached a piece of dark colour string to the hanging catchers outside of the main door. When pulled it slowly, it gave knocking sounds to the roomers and they came outside to see the knocker but found nobody at the door. It was really indecent enjoyment.
Summer nights were full of excitement in those days. Sometimes, it started raining at night and we had come down to the first floor. The whole activity became a comic scene: light went off, holding the beds and bedsheets, throwing comforters down and everyone wished to sleep on the bed inside the room. After a few minutes, it stopped raining and again we came up to sleep in the open. And sometimes we didn’t get a chance to move back.
One of the most precious activities of my summer night that I still quote every to encourage the students how to build up their determination even though their senses are quite absent. In my school days, I could never grasp the correct use of ‘was, were & did’. But the wish to learn the concept was still high when entered college. One night I decided not to sleep until I cleared this concept. After the death of my father, we were told to earn our living. I was one of four brothers and four sisters in the family. I had two elders and one younger brother.
During those days I used to sleep on the roof in the fresh air in May & June. Though it was very hot during the day, the nights became a bit pleasant after midnight. By afternoon I took a glass made of plastic with different layers. These layers are different pieces that were linked as the top one was pressed, squeezed and formed a small packet. Easy to carry in the pocket. If the top one was pulled up, it formed a glass. I used a heated knife to make a hole in the centre of the glass and fixed a holder to make it a table lamp. There was a bulb of fifty watts inside the glass and I didn’t know how the heat would affect it. It looked very beautiful when the switch was on.
After taking my dinner, I laid my bed and put some grammar books on the table and started studying tenses one by one. The first one was the Present Indefinite Tense to onward. I wanted to learn the use of ‘was, were’ and ‘did’. I was always confused about the use of these two tenses. Suddenly the blub blew up exactly when I was studying the Past Continuous Tense. Hardly I had grasped the present tense and the bang made me learn two things: I was mistaken when I used plastic glass for the lamp, and the second one was the difference between ‘was/were’ and ‘did’. It was my first night that started me off.
The family couldn’t afford the expense of extra tuition fees. I started private tuition when I was in my second year in college. One day I was getting my hair cut at a barber’s shop, and a boy told me that he wanted to change his subject. He was my junior in college. I suggested that he study Statistics. Then he asked me who would teach him. I told him that I would teach him. That boy was my pupil and his younger brother was the second one. After one month I got my first earnings and how happy I was!. This private tuition helped me a lot in my onward journey in my studies.
Cheer!
