Rammohan Mission High School

Prince Anwar Shah Road is always a chaotic place, especially near Lake Gardens where the traffic seems to never stop. Rammohan Mission High School is right in the middle of all that energy, sitting at P 1/C. If you stand in the courtyard, you can hear the constant honking of buses and the general roar of South Kolkata. The school building has that solid, aged look that many places in this city have, with thick walls that keep out some of the heat. Our corridors are usually filled with the sound of students reciting their lessons or the heavy footsteps of teachers moving between floors. The wooden benches in the older classrooms are worn smooth from years of use, and there is a specific smell of old paper and ink that lingers in the library. We spend a lot of time just managing the flow of people in such a busy area. During the monsoon, the street outside can get a bit flooded, and we all have to hike up our clothes to get inside. The staff room is a small, cluttered space where we drink a lot of tea and talk about the kids who are struggling or the ones who just won't stop talking in class. It is a very normal, slightly messy environment where the focus is just on the students and their books, away from the shine of the newer city buildings.