Even now, when I think back on it, I feel terribly embarrassed. On my birthday, all the women from the neighboring houses would come for the celebration, and when they left, every single one of them would insist on kissing me before going. I found it utterly disgusting and irritating. Once, I even said to my mother, quite firmly, “What is this, Amma! It’s so revolting, all these women smothering me with kisses—my skin crawls. Do they think I’m a little girl or something? If this goes on, I swear I’ll never be born again. Don’t celebrate my birthday anymore. Do you know how childish it makes me feel? And why do all those silly women have to kiss me anyway? Is it even allowed for them to do that, Amma? They’re all such fools! Let them keep their distance,” I blurted out one day. My mother and the others burst out laughing, and then, just to tease me, they kissed me even more. In my childhood, everything happened with such fun and mischief.

Leaving that village was hard for me, and for my mother, leaving me behind was even harder. But for the sake of my studies, there was no choice but to go to Narsapur. They had decided that there was no use staying in our village any longer, so on an auspicious day, they took me to Narsapur, handed me over to my aunt’s house, and got me admitted to the first form at the Taylor High School there.

Until then, though it was not far from us, I had never seen Narsapur. When I saw the houses, the buildings, the court, the high school, the canal, the Godavari—everything—I was overwhelmed. If Narsapur was like this, I wondered what Rajahmundry and other big towns must be like, but I couldn’t even imagine it. Seeing the school, the teachers, and their ways, I felt nervous for quite some time. None of the teachers showed me any special affection. Unlike in my village, no one put their arm around my shoulder or made me sit close to them. I thought, “What kind of place is this? Is this my village? Is this some street-side school? No, this is a big institution.” For a while, I tried to console myself with such thoughts. Here, unlike in my village where we sat on mats or wooden planks on the verandah, the children all sat at desks.

Master sat far away on his chair, and so, unlike in our village school where the teacher would be close by, here there seemed to be a great distance between the master and the children. Still, the teachers here were very good people. They would keep a thousand eyes on us, constantly watching to see if the boys were listening attentively to what he said or not, making sure no one misbehaved. Yet, no matter how carefully he watched, there were always some boys who managed to be naughty. They would shake this way and