Sha-Shib School

If you go to Ashoka Garden in Bhopal, specifically around the Nigam Colony area, you’ll find Sha-Shib School at number 63, Ashok Vihar Nagar. It’s a busy neighborhood and we are right in the thick of it. The school is a vertical building, so there is a lot of going up and down stairs all day long. My legs are usually tired by three o’clock. We have classrooms on different floors, and you can hear the voices echoing through the stairwells. The teachers here are a hardworking bunch. They arrive early, often carrying bags full of corrected homework and lunch boxes. We don't have a massive campus with fields, but we make use of the space we have. The kids are always finding corners to play in. It’s a bit of a maze if you aren't used to it. We deal with the usual city stuff—traffic noise from the street and the occasional power cut. We just keep some torches handy and carry on with the lesson. There isn't any polished marketing here. We just tell parents what we are doing and how the kids are progressing. It’s a very local feel. Most of the students live within walking distance, so we see the parents at the grocery store or the bus stop. It makes the whole thing feel like a big, slightly disorganized family rather than a corporate institution. It’s just a part of the local community.