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February 2026: "A Normal Childhood" by Ivor Mitchelmore
After tiffin, I visited Marshal Duar Girls Hostel for only the second time in my first week in India. I have had other engagements, but also I sometimes worry about what I will do when I get there. Anyway, I spent some time seeing whose names I could remember – not many of the younger ones yet, but 12 in total, which is just under half. I asked Soma how her Board exams were going, and how her History exam had gone today. Then I tried to ask them what games they liked to play. Shrabonti and Treesha did their best to interpret for me; Shrabonti is regaining her old confidence in speaking English. In the end they played a game a bit like Kabadi, except that they say ‘Tick, tick, tick’ all the time. I could not understand it at all, but they had great fun. Treesha was very good with the little ones, like a mother making sure they were OK. She is another lovely girl. While some of them were playing that game, others amused themselves. Not for the first time I saw Chandni (age 7) sitting on the steps of the old school building and pouring fine dirt from one little container – homemade – into another. When I mentioned it to Shrabonti, she said she was cooking.
Seeing those girls having so much fun with so little, again made me think of the poverty of children in the UK. Not a poverty of material possessions, but a poverty of childhood. They have had those simple pleasures taken away from them. I wouldn’t say that Chandni was having fun, but she was at peace in her own little world of imagination. How many children of my generation had imaginary tea parties with teapots and cups and saucers? I had to leave as I could feel the tears springing into my eyes.
Ivor