LIFE BY LOUIS: Spare a thought for the Form One student

Adjusting to the new boarding school life is always a tough hack. In the first few weeks there is nothing new to learn, and you spend all your preps reading the dictionary and atlas that you came with. ILLUSTRATION| IGAH

What you need to know:

  • The only reason I could not stay long in the club is that I was very shy. I could not understand how you could just walk into a girls’ school one day and talk to a random girl you had not met before and then she becomes your girlfriend.  
  • I used to find it almost magical and beyond comprehension of a village boy who had just come from Karugo Group of Schools.

As you are getting over the hangover of Njaanuary blues, take some time to remember a little boy somewhere who’s going through a more trying time: the Form One student.

Adjusting to the new boarding school life is always a tough hack. In the first few weeks there is nothing new to learn, and you spend all your preps reading the dictionary and atlas that you came with.

This is also the period to go through orientation, select your elective subjects and extra-curricular activities that you wish be engaged in.  

The most difficult part for me when I joined Form One was choosing which club to join.

One of the most favourite clubs was the Drama Club. It was favoured by the boys because key among the activities was visiting or hosting the neighbouring girls schools for plays and dancing competitions.  

MAGICAL

The only reason I could not stay long in the club is that I was very shy. I could not understand how you could just walk into a girls’ school one day and talk to a random girl you had not met before and then she becomes your girlfriend.  

I used to find it almost magical and beyond comprehension of a village boy who had just come from Karugo Group of Schools.

Where would I even start? I would conjure up scenarios and heart winning conversations in my head.

 “Hey there. My name is Son of Njoki and I am from Matimbei. I am in form one and my hobbies are watching butterflies and collecting postage stamps. I know music by Mariah Carey and Michael Bolton. I read James Hadley Chase novels and Mills & Boon. Will you be my girlfriend?”

NATURALLY GIFTED

Unlike me, there were students who were naturally gifted in the art of tuning girlfriends. In one visit alone, they would come out with a list of a couple of girls that they had approached. Love letters would be exchanged and in the week after a visit, the mail traffic in the school would go wild. Such letters would be circulated in the dormitory to be read by all boys. The letters contained very deep romantic content in carefully drafted English, mostly drafted using teamwork from the best students in class. On the envelopes were drawn hearts and arrows and written ‘Open with a smile’ which we found to be so deep. 

I remember one day we went to a faraway drama club event that had attendance from the top schools in the province. The minute we stepped out of the bus my colleagues were all over getting introduced to girls from different schools. Meanwhile I was just there rehearsing pick-up lines in my head, just in case one girl came my way or just fell off from the skies. 

NEVER FELT SO LOST

It never happened. I have never felt so lost in my entire life. I made myself busy walking in the parking lot admiring other school buses. Finally it was time to leave. Students like me who did not get new friends were ridiculed that we had floated and we never got breathing space in the bus on the way back to school. More ridicule awaited us in the dormitories that evening.

The lucky boys who had made numerous friends would regale the other boys in the dormitory the whole night with stories of their successful escapades. This made our misery more profound.

I left drama club soon after I joined Form Two after I realised that I was going to float until I disobeyed gravity. I joined the Agriculture Club whose membership was bland and boring. We only visited the local day mixed schools to learn how to grow arrowroots, and the girls there spoke fluent vernacular. They were always glad to be associated with students from our school, and becoming friends with them was much easier.

***

Do you have feedback on this story? E-mail: [email protected]