STREETLIGHTS

                                                                                                        From the pen-APN

When I stepped out of my house that November evening and opened the main iron gates, I was welcomed by tall streetlights which were scattering pleasant milky brightness as far as they could. The slender asphalt road, although worn out, looked majestic with the night sky overhead. The gleaming streetlights of the roadsides and the slightly misty and cool atmosphere were like the beauty of a dreamland.  The street was dominated by silence and loneliness and was a sight of pure magical charm and subtle beauty. The lighted view of the street stretching itself into the distant dark and mingling somewhere ahead indistinctly raised a good deal of philosophical thoughts and fixed my eyes in the distant horizon like a stoic. I could sense only some distant shadows. However, I could not but appreciate the immediate air and light which exhaled hope, joy, warmth and all-embracing love.      

I slowly walked ahead, chasing the lights. My hands were resting calmly in my trouser pockets, and so was my mind serenely resting in the soothing light. Further, in the silence of that wintry night, the easy wind was stripping off all my impurities and the lights were anointing my soul.

After a few moments’ walk, I stood beneath one streetlight that was close to the main entrance of my building. I wished “Goodnight” to all those confidently beaming and gleaming pillars of light and then went inside to have a peaceful night’s sleep.

    

Was It Simply A Dream?

From the pen-APN

(Dedicated to People's College Buguda)

When I woke up I knew that it was simply a dream.  But that dream made me sob uncontrollably and feel intensely some deep bonding that existed between me and the academic institution where I used to teach. I had almost drifted out of my sleep but I could not calm myself because my heart was still throbbing with some rush of emotions. In that dream, I had experienced one of the saddening farewell meetings and had witnessed the sorrowful pangs of a man who was departing from an institution where he had worked for a few years. I saw the man ruminating about his precious golden memories. To him, those departing moments were the moments of great discovery when he could realise the depth of his relationship with the said academic institution. At that point of that sad departure only, the man could realise how caring, loving and invaluable was the institution to him.

It is needless to say that the man in the dream was none but me.

The dream was over. I was then awake but I got amazed at my own feelings. In the silence of the morning, I realised how the soul of an institution spoke to me, softened my heart, moistened my eyes, stirred up many hidden feelings and demanded unfaltering dedication from me. Although it was just a dream, I could not ignore those life-like reactions, spontaneous responses and the warm feelings which I had experienced so vividly in my sleep. The memory of such a dream had stirred up some deep emotional state which had hitherto remained undiscovered in me.

I thanked those dreamy moments because they helped me understand my feelings better and resulted in some attitudinal changes at the personal and spiritual levels as well. Nobody knew what had happened to me but I was a changed man. I was lost in my newfound fond feelings for the institution and I was motivated for better work culture and pursuits of excellence.

When I got up and looked myself at the mirror, the figure in the mirror smiled back at me and told, “Afterall, tomorrow is another day and your days are not yet over”

 

A Teacher's Response to COVID19 Second Wave

 

From the Pen-APN

All the hard times, the sad times and the confused times may begin with Covid. With some imperceptible viral load, your body’s temperature may rise and, in tandem, your degree of isolation too. Those who are optimistic and hopeful of another fine morning are seen mentally reiterating, “If not today, then tomorrow the temperature will subside and the world will be all dance and fun as before.” But while doing so and hoping against hope, the most optimistic one unluckily may have given a super chance to the malicious virus to play its fatal game. The light of the day will diminish and by the evening, that hopeful and healthy person will find to his /her dismay that the oxygen level is steeply decreasing, in perfect tune with an approaching dark night.

Those who are fortunate find timely care and adequate medical assistance and those who are less fortunate miss the same and mishaps appear in the news. Unless the friends, relatives and family members take early steps to make medical assistance available to the diseased, it will often become too late.  

Now some pertinent questions are posed in a broader perspective, “How far can we provide adequatemedical support to the vast population of this country? Can our Medical Infrastructure and trained workforce sustain such massive outbreaks? Are the Governments doing the needful? Do the general public and service providers behave sensibly and refrain from overcharging the distressed?”

All the questions will have the inevitable “NOs”.

It is the point where we miserably stand. As an educationist, I cannot wait further, hoping against hope that some Government will come to my rescue and improve my fate with a magical wand. Those pink dreams are already stolen long back. Now I say to myself, “History bears testimony that the teaching fraternity can build a nation of order and harmony by educating young minds.” It is a universal truth, “everything may be lost but the future still remains.” And the teachers are the privileged ones who tune the future in their classrooms. As an antidote to such troubled affairs, the teaching fraternity can work miracle just by shifting their focus a bit. Now let us not simply build the future of our youth, now let us build our youth for the future. This is the need of the time. The vision has to become broader which can affect the future of our nation in a decade if we start it today in the classrooms. Hope for the best for another educational revolution…. Jay Hind, Jay Bharat!

Shakespeare's Macbeth, A Cinematic Discussion

From the pen-APN

Dear Friends, 

I have presented a cinematic discussion on Macbeth on my YouTube Channel, APN'S EDUCREATIONS. I fervently hope the video will help all my students in their preparations. In this blogpost I pen down the transcript of my video which will serve as an invaluable note to answer questions on Shakespeare's Macbeth. Click the given link to visit the video

Shakespeare's Macbeth, Odisha State Model Syllabus, English Honours. - YouTube

"Macbeth is a play of unbridled ambition and regicide.

Power has a price and it is paid in blood.

When ambition goes unrestrained without moral restrictions, destruction results.

Macbeth is a classic tale about an ambitious Scottish lord who seizes the throne with the help of his wife, Lady Macbeth.

Macbeth is not naturally inclined to commit evil deeds but he deeply desires power and the throne. His inordinate desire for power has a great price and, in the play, it is paid in blood.

Macbeth tells the story of a brave Scottish general (Macbeth) who receives a prophecy from a trio of sinister witches that one day he will become king of Scotland. Consumed with ambitious thoughts and spurred to action by his wife, Macbeth murders King Duncan and seizes the throne for himself. He begins his reign haunted by guilt and fear and soon becomes a tyrannical ruler. His guilt and his paranoid mental state now force him to commit more and more murders to protect himself from enmity and suspicion. Macbeth’s insecurities, his guilt complex and fear for punishment result in the murder of Banquo. Macduff’s wife and children in a series of heinous crimes. This bloodbath and consequent civil war rapidly take Macbeth and Lady Macbeth into the realms of madness and death.

Shakespeare’s Macbeth is a play with a difference. This is the only play where he has introduced the witches. It is the only play where the hero turns into a villain. It is the only play in which poetic justice is meted out. 

Temptation begets sin. And sin begets unresolved inner conflicts. Out of unresolved inner conflicts, there comes a series of irrational behavior that finally meets an inevitable punishment. "

 With Love,

APN SIR

An Ideal Education System

 

From the pen-APN

The learners’ minds are not like empty pitchers, where you being the educators, are assigned the arduous task of filling them with some essential information as per syllabi. The education system that runs on such a precinct is doomed to fail. Education is something that liberates and widens the horizon of human thinking. Giving leverage to freedom of thoughts and making the mind self-reliant for conducting independent pursuits of knowledge and explorations of new vistas of human perception are the basic tenets of an ideal education system. And these high aspirations of human existence require a strong foundation of spiritual consciousness. This is the only way through which the high ideals of our education system can be realized.