My Mam. My lifelong friend

Teachers give us direction, show us the way and then move out of the way to make us feel like winners. We all have one such teacher in our lives.

Mine is Mrs. Niharika Joshi. My English and Social Studies Teacher from class 8 to class 10. Respected and loved by all, she is my all time favourite.

The one important lesson she taught all of us in the class is that we are actually learning what we are learning only when we implement our lessons in our day to day life. Be it learning a new language, a new concept in any subject, unless we retain the knowledge and utilize the knowledge properly, our learnings end in mere degrees ( of course we imbibed this lesson much later in life).

She is the teacher to whom I owe my communication skills in English. And even Hindi, because she shared her knowledge of Hindi very often with us, which helped us greatly in understanding grammar in both the languages.

She is the teacher who made the subject of History and Civics, Geography and Economics as interesting as a storybook. We did not have to memorize anything. The details were etched in our minds for a long time.

She never scolded the kids directly. She looked at us and we used to turn silent. She always told stories with morals to show that someone is misbehaving in the class. And the culprit always somehow knew, he/she was being referred to.

She is the teacher at whose house, we were treated to lip snacking delicacies, the recipes of which she never shared. Her standard response would be “ when you feel like eating this, come over, I will cook for you”.

She is the teacher who taught us never to visit someone's house without prior information. The surprise you plan may not work well if the people of the house are having their private issues or joys and do not want to be disturbed.

She is the one who has stood by me during my most trying times later in life and has been a constant source of support and understanding and natural love.

It is from her that I have developed this interest and passion of teaching at modest state board schools.

A strong woman herself, with lots of anecdotes to share, she is my role model. She is instrumental in me being a strong charactered woman.

I still learn from her. Every time I talk to her.

Thank you, Teacher

I love you, mam.

Always