Too much of school sounds like a negative reaction, like having too much of a good thing. When my mom finally decided to take that plum posting as a Divisional Head, I knew I was in trouble. Her office hours stretched way beyond my school hours. And anyway, I was privy to the many discussions my parents had about ‘Honey, what do we do with the kids?’ Well, finally they struck gold – an after-school educational program. Won’t that be just grand? Kids are learning new things while parents are happily minting greenbacks!

And so, we went directly to another class after our school. The brochure said that they would be ‘using fun activities and innovative teaching methods to fill the gap in your child’s understanding.’ I suppose they meant that the teacher would write down the homework and we were to copy it. At least, this is what happened most of the time. Of course, we didn’t tell our parents. How would that help? They’d merely get smart and shift us to a class that would actually make us solve our homework.

I hated the classes. Mostly, I was bored to tears or falling asleep.  After so many hours at school who’d want to spend the entire afternoon with the same books? But, as a child, one had little choice in these matters. Especially when one’s parents were cleverly telling one that mommy’s salary will help get us that spanking new TV or that video game.

Lose some, win some!

Then, one day, my sister decided to rock the proverbial boat. She decided she had enough of studying and refused to go to the after-school program. That’s when my parents began to smell something stale. Shortly after that, they put us in a better program (o, yes, another educational one). This was bigger, brighter and somehow more fun. We had some exciting games, and a COMPUTER too. Each of us got a chance to do something on the PC (this, when PCs were just beginning to make their presence felt). We somehow managed to blaze through our homework, most of which had to be done by us. Then it was time to have fun. We had a little bit of everything. Acting classes, speech, games and of course painting. Those hours we spent splashing color on pages and laughing at silly jokes were really the highlight of an otherwise dull day. Ironically, I began looking forward to my after school program.

Now, so many years afterward, when I need to take up a job and leave my own child alone till I get back, I know how vital these after-school programs have become. Talk about history repeating itself! I just hope I’d get her into a good one, and yes, it’s going to be educational too.

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