Darla School Literary Club-A Voice of Imagination

An Activity in Progress

Learners should be given freedom in gathering, structuring, and assembling their ideas. They should be allowed to understand, communicate, and write freely. As educators, all we need to provide is proper guidance as their ideas evolve.

The School English Literary Club aims to fulfill that need. With the increasing demand for creative talent in every sphere of life—something that has become especially prominent as modern societies grow more complex—the Literary Club seeks to shape well-rounded individuals, nurturing values such as love, peace, understanding, and aesthetic appreciation. It also helps members develop into charismatic, trustworthy, and well-rounded individuals.

Life is a concoction and creation of many forces. The club helps build a vision for students to live by, creating a home away from home through imagination. They learn to fly on the wings of creative ideas.

Similarly, my school has many clubs. They are strategically planned in writing with full commitment and are executed properly. I believe clubs provide stimulation, relaxation, and interest, especially when students are burdened by physical and mental strain.

Various clubs—such as Health, Home Science, Nature, Tarayana, Salon, and Maintenance—cater to students' needs. Every Wednesday during the 7th period, students from class four and above rush to their respective clubs. Each club has its own written framework, aims, and objectives, and activities are carried out for one hour.

The main aim of our Literary Club is to help members enhance their language skills and nurture their literary talents. It also encourages club members—and through them, other students—to compose literary articles and maintain the literary board. We successfully conduct the activities planned for each club meeting. The club further helps members become more competent in their awareness of current affairs and general knowledge.

Below are some of our activities for the year 2014:

1. Play vocabulary games such as crosswords, jumbled words, puzzles, etc.
2. Share experiences through verbal and written mediums.
3. Tell quizzes and riddles.
4. Write creative articles, including short poems, short essays, short stories, and other free-writing activities.
5. Engage in instant story creation.
6. Read interesting articles focused on creative and imaginative writing.
7. Talk about and discuss poetry, stories, novels, and drama (at the very least, members learn to appreciate, experience, and enjoy varied genres).
8. Write book reviews.
9. Display articles on the board.
10. Edit articles for the school magazine.
11. Enact short skits or plays.
12. Coordinate all school literary activities, including debates, quizzes, and extempore speeches.

A Wise Tree-Jangchub Shing

Do you watch a program called Jangchub Shing hosted by Mr. Karma Dendup every Thursday on BBS 2? If you don't, you should. If you can't, I pity your Thursday evenings. This program is of immense benefit to us viewers—and by "immense benefit," I mean it gives us something better to do than scrolling through Facebook and arguing about whether instant noodles are ruining our culture.

I personally take out time to watch the show. That's right. I could be doing anything else—sleeping, eating, staring at a wall—but I choose Jangchub Shing. I would like to sincerely thank Mr. Karma Dendup for this show. He asks rebellious questions. Real-world questions. The kind that make monks choke on their butter tea. Kudos to him for awakening us to the basics of the Buddhist religion—things we should have learned but were probably too busy memorizing pop song lyrics.

Thanks to him, I learned something important: there is a vast difference between religion and spirituality. Religion, let's be honest, often leads to egotism. ("I pray more than you, so I'm holier.") Spirituality, on the other hand, leads more often to humility. ("I know nothing, and that's fine.") One makes you wear a bigger crown; the other makes you take it off. Now, out of my own unawareness—or perhaps my stubborn interest—I asked him two layman questions last time. Layman questions, meaning the kind that make scholars sweat and Rinpoches suddenly remember an urgent appointment. I requested that he ask these questions for better illumination. He said he would. I'm holding my breath. It's turning purple.

The only path to spiritual enlightenment, as I understand it, is understanding and grasping one's own mind. We can attain this through constant meditation and mental contemplation—called gom in Dzongkha. In other words, it's basically knowing your soul. But here's the catch: what is the soul? Shape? Round like a momo? Flat like a pancake? Colour? Blue? Invisible? Size? As big as a watermelon? As small as a lentil? Empty? Full? Half-full like my optimism on a Monday morning? To attain the level of full realization—knowing the soul—is said to be the highest level. That's when you can be born into nirvana. Wonderful. But the process of identifying the nature of the soul—whether it's empty or not, whether it dies or not—is where things get slippery.

The concrete meaning of the soul and its whereabouts is surprisingly difficult to get from any Rinpoche. They say it's a secret. A kind of "cannot share." A "not allowed to reveal." Which makes me wonder: if religion is for the benefit of all sentient beings, and if Rinpoches, Lamas, and sages are supposed to liberate all sentient beings, why do our saviors say it's so difficult to get this information? Why can't it be shared easily? Why can't it be shown—just shown once—so that we all become Buddha-nature and finally liberate ourselves from suffering? Is the soul hiding? Is it shy? Does it have social anxiety? I'm not asking for a full biography. Just a rough sketch. A hint. A breadcrumb.

Teachers’ Day

Not long ago, teachers in Bhutan didn’t have a designated Teachers' Day. Not because anyone forgot—but because teachers were already held in such high regard. Interestingly, it’s still not marked on the national calendar as Teachers' Day. Instead, the observance coincides with the birth anniversary of the 3rd Druk Gyalpo.

I remember this day becoming truly important thanks to our former education minister, T.S. Powdyel. He placed teachers above all other civil servants—at least in speeches. With great erudition and even greater enthusiasm, he compared teachers to gurus, the ones who enlighten. He used soft, persuasive words to woo and uplift us, though without much in the way of financial support or improved living standards. In the end, he gifted us a mountain of philosophies, policies, strategies, and plans—so much that teachers were overloaded and more confused than ever. One fine example: the Green School, Green Bhutan concept. Lovely idea. Though I suspect it was really meant to be Clean School, Clean Bhutan.

Now, the present minister? On Teachers' Day, he’s about as responsive as a dead log. Meanwhile, the trend of juvenile Teachers' Day celebrations is honking loudly in the background. And honestly, a really big honk is needed to remind everyone once again that teachers are the true builders of the nation’s future.

Pity the modern teacher, buried under a mountain of work: teaching, monitoring, guiding, planning (I won't list them all—you’d fall asleep). And at the end of it all? A dry, meager salary as the fruit of all that hard labour.

So on this day, I’d like to plead on behalf of all poor teachers: give less for less, and more for more. As of now, no teacher in the country is a Lakhpati. Or even a thousandpati. Frankly, not even a hundredpati. In the end, it all boils down to higher incentives. Not dignity of labour, not respect, not the kind of work—just money. And sadly, it’s the other way around.

Still, I wish to thank my own teachers for making me who I am today and for making a real difference in my life. And to all teachers out there, here’s my wish: Teach from the heart, not just from the book. The book won’t remember you. The heart will.

From google

Our Country, Our Rights

Sanjaya Baru’s book, The Accidental Prime Minister: The Making and Unmaking of Manmohan Singh, hit the markets during a political storm and election frenzy in India. It has certainly created ripples between the two major parties, the BJP and the Indian National Congress.

Judging by the title, the book appears to criticize Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his tenure. First, he is portrayed as an “accidental” prime minister. Second, the implication is that his time in office did not secure a promising future for India.

What I appreciate most about the book—and even its title—is the freedom of writing and speech it represents. This is a privilege many countries are deprived of and desperately need. Consider their voices, their rights, their freedom of expression. Look at their print media and press freedom. In some nations, criticizing or giving negative feedback to those in power is simply not allowed. If someone dares to do so, they are damned, rebuked, and admonished. Such societies pretend to be utopian but are in fact dystopian. Some put on a gentle facade while offering only limited freedom. Is it freedom of choice? Or freedom of individuality? Their voices are smothered, controlled, and hidden. There is no such thing as “Our country, our rights.”

From Google