June the 5th

Come, fill the cup and in the fire of Spring
The winter garment of repentance fling:
The bird of time has but a little way
To fly -- and Lo! the Bird is on the wing!
--Omar Khayyam,The Rubaiyat

The bird of time has indeed flown, and yes it has been ages but the memory of every 5th of June is still crystal clear in my head! June 5th or Environment Day was one of the eagerly awaited days of our school summer breaks. We and loads of other kids of our building and around would be grateful to Raju uncle and Manju aunty for introducing us to this special day at Nehru foundation/CEE (Centre of Environment Education).

Every june 5th will start with a bunch of kids gathering outside our building gate and then we will proceed to CEE looking no less than a marching band, not coz of what we wore but the sheer amount of noise that accompanied us. And why wouldn't it be, we were a varied age group, maximum kids belonged to my youngest sis kitto's age and around, then a few kakoo's and as usual i was the eldest and usually only one of my age. It was implicit that my duty was to make sure every one was reaching safely to CEE which was walking distance from our house, but involved a major national highway to be crossed on foot, a scare to few parents. We had found a shortcut a small wood kind of place , which then used to be a open Shamshan Ghat and now looks like this fancy place but still is Shamshan Ghat.I am sure the kids never thought of it as my duty but i used to be very serious about getting them in one piece and invariably would be upset with one or two for not holding hands while crossing!

No one cared. What was to come was more exciting. Colorful clays, environment drawings,national geographic mini movie serieses, sessions on best out of waste, saving electricity,water and garbage management. The later became an independent entity and was a full time project for my twelfth standard summer vacations.

It was fun, we would hunt for schedules and will make sure we reach at concerned session rooms in time. Of course in between i would find loads of time to meet new people and invariably will have 4 to 5 new friends, yes i was pretty good at that back then.

One of my favourite activities was to paint T-shirts and watch any movies which had monkeys in it. I have a fascination for monkeys , i guess its hereditary, my mom loves them too (i know what you are thinking,but thats not what i mean). Creating environment related logos was another favorite pass time. I remember how one of the kids made same logo two years in the row. It was mandatory to have a picture and a caption. So mostly it will be a drop of water with different captions, Save water , save Life. Water is Life. Water is Precious PLEASE save it. Or a lighting symbol with Save Electricity, Switch it Off etc captions.Yes they were the same old words twisted around, but nothing could beat the passion that accompanied the task. There was a sense of importance and responsibility attached when we wrote such so called cliched lines. Putting those drawing up for viewing we felt very important, CEE had given us a platform to learn and share some thing which we would have taken lightly (even though my mom would take us to task for one unnecessary running fan), the charm of learning it our self ( so we thought) was special.

I am sure , i am not the only one who thinks that these small posters and little gyan instilled in our subconscious, the basics of respecting the nature and its resources. It is an entirely different story that the few days after June 5th were a little annoying for few friends and family, as we would sit counting the resources we wasted yesterday and how in few years people of Gujarat will die without water. Of course some were self made stories and people of Gujarat are very much alive and still the same like any where else, some saving, some wasting, some aware, some irresponsible.

Its been ages now since those summer june 5th outings and people around me will still tell you how the sound of running water in sink makes me uncomfortable. I cannot take it when men keep the tap running while shaving or matter of fact any one last to leave the room and not switching of the lights. It has become my habit and yes for which i have heard some vishesh tippanies too in school and offices, such as 'Perfectly entitled for position of peon' or 'switch watch-women' as one of my good friends joked!But to my rescue, for gods sake for the first time in my life i have tried to applied something i have learned! Help me here please!

And yes this time when i decide to visit home i will make sure to have a look at the beautiful campus of CEE, of course if the guard allows me in there!