My First Standard Teacher: Miss Magdhalen D’Silva. In 1956, I was admitted to first standard in the Diocesan Board’s Primary School, at Trasi, Kundapura Taluka, Dakshina Kannada District (Now Trasi is in Udupi District). I studied in this school up to the first standard only. The school then had classes up to fourth standard only with three lady teachers. Miss Magdhalen D’ Silva for the first standard. Miss Angela D’Souza for the second standard. Miss Elfreeda D’Souza (but everyone called her as Alfred teacher!!!) for the third and fourth standards. All of them were spinsters. In fact in those days most of the Catholic teachers were spinsters!!! Due to this they were really dedicated and lovable teachers. They were like our mothers in school. In those days their salary was very low. Only those who had great passion for teaching became teachers. In those days, teaching was more of a vocation than a profession to earn money. If we were absent for two days for classes, our teachers visited our homes to find out reasons. Such was their dedication and concern to their students.
My primary school was a Kannada medium school. The school had a paddy grass thatched roof. It also had a sufficiently large play ground. The property for this school was donated by my mother’s D’Silva clan. Teachers had one wooden chair and one small wooden table. We students sat on the floor. Girls sat in front rows and boys behind them. In an ordinary cloth bag we carried the Kannada text book, a slate, a slate pencil to write, and a a piece of cloth to wipe the slate. Nothing else was required to carry to the school. The morning session of the school was from 9.45am to 12.45pm. Then lunch break. We came home for lunch. The second session was from 2pm to 5 pm. Everyday we had games and catechism in the school. No homework, no tension for us and our parents !!! Everything was done and corrected in the school itself (Nowadays, mostly the homework of primary students is done by parents and not by students!!!) A stick was always kept on teacher’s table. However, I do not remember Magdhalen teacher (all called her Maggi teacher) using that stick even once. She always wore a light coloured saree. She was quite pretty without any make-up, soft spoken and lovable teacher. She always had a serene smile on her face. She made a great impression on me as my first standard teacher. I loved to look at her and listened to her gentle voice. She told us many moral stories. She took us out of the classroom on the school ground and under the shadow of a tree she taught us Kannada, arithmetic, catechism, and many other things. We children loved to carry her chair to the ground and then to bring it back. Loud reading, chorus drill, singing was our daily routine. We wrote on the slate with slate pencil and wiped it and wrote on it again and again. Due to this no burden of stationery expenses to our parents. We had no burden of carrying books like a donkey as the present day students are forced to do it. Rainy season we carried palm leaf umbrella called “satem” in Konknni. It could not be folded. It had a fix structure. It lasted for us two years. To last it longer my mother applied tar on its outer surface. We children had no footwear. Yet, we could walk, run and play with our bare feet without any problem. We had no uniform. Simple cotton clothes we wore. We really enjoyed our school days with a lot of fun. After I joined the Jesuits in 1971, I got the news that Magdhalen teacher married to Robert Rodrigues. Deep down in my heart I felt sad, because I felt that I lost my Maggi teacher who for all these years was very dear to me and now she belongs to someone else. It was like losing your dream girl or girlfriend. Jealousy and attachment were the reasons for this sadness. After I became a Jesuit priest, I found out with much difficulty, Maggi teacher’s home at Koteshwara, Kundapura Taluka and visited her. She took some time to recognize me. But when I told her my maternal grandfather’s and my mother’ s name she was really filled with emotion of affection. She narrated to me, how my maternal grandparents helped and cared for her. Magdhalen teacher was born on 11.03.1934 and left this world on 09.03.2008. Though now she is no more physically in this world, she continues to live in my heart as a lively, lovable and holy teacher of positive values. I have absolutely no memory of her even a single negative quality. She surely continues to live in the memory of her hundreds of students. Her niece (sister’s daughter) Philomena Pais is married to my maternal aunt’s son Richard Almeida and lives at Kundapura. From her I got the photograph of Maggi teacher and certain details. I often tell primary teachers that their role is most important, holy, and precious in the life of students. Because, they lay the solid foundation in the lives of their students. Usually students do not forget their primary teachers. Therefore, primary teachers should be proud of their holy vocation and mission. May the tribe of my Maggi teacher increase. May she continue to bless and intercede for her students including me. Thank you Maggi teacher and enjoy your heavenly bliss and peace. Yours affectionately, Pratap Naik sj 05th September 2021
