School Buoy

D Is For Darjeeling, Where I Went To School

Mount Kanchenjunga, Darjeeling. Photograph copyright: JAMSHED MADAN

I'm following the Letter Of The Week theme set by Mrs Nesbitt, using the letter D for week four. I’m also in the market for a larger size of bowler hat after B, who writes I Gotta B, said I’m her ``second favourite Aussie after Keith Urban''. On the weekend, she picked up on a comment of mine and asked for more details on my boarding school background. I was very privileged to attend St Joseph’s College, Darjeeling, a school that occupies a very special place in my heart.

We pupils were there for nine months of the year, from late February to late November, hundreds of miles away from our families. But we lived in a totally secure environment, where the Belgian and Canadian Jesuits and the Indian lay teachers treated us with the utmost respect and where our personal safety was an unwritten guarantee. The staff were our surrogate parents and I reckon I speak for many North Pointers when I say those were golden years.

Our school motto was the Latin ``Sursum Corda'', meaning ``lift up your hearts''. Part of our school anthem was the line ``We’ll stand, boys, like men to each other’’ and even after all these years, I am still in close contact with many of my classmates, who are spread out across the world. You can read more about the school in my post No Bully Beef. And for other North Pointers out there, I was in Fallon House and my senior room was Room No. 221 in the corridor that overlooked Fraser Hall.

Interestingly enough, a couple of days ago I also had a comment from Canadian blogger Les Becker, who writes Drawing On A Great Experience. Les followed a link to the article My Role In The Diary of Anne Frank and pointed out that the sets for that school production were amazing. Yes, Les, I was lucky to do a lot of theatre and that was the most elaborate stage I ever acted on.

I wonder if my fellow North Pointer, the US-based Sandip Madan, who writes the thought-provoking blog Things Blight And Beautiful, would care to give us his views on the best boarding school in the world. Stay tuned.

Finally, as you'll see in the photograph below, the backdrop to the school was an amazing mountain range. Not just any range, either. That is Mount Kanchenjunga, the second-highest peak in the world. It was the first sight that greeted us every morning of our lives - and I don't think we inky schoolboys really understood just how privileged we were. I reckon we simply took that sight for granted.

Photograph copyright: North Point Alumni Association www.npalumni.org