The Year We Stopped Being Afraid
The Year We Stopped Being Afraid
In1965, I was ten years old and in Class 5A. This was St, Anthony’s College, run by Christian Brothers some seven kilometers north of Colombo, Sri Lanka, then Ceylon.
Until then, our classrooms had belonged almost entirely to women. The teachers were familiar, gentle and predictable. Then came Mr Suraweera.
He was a large, burly man with a short temper and a reputation that reached us before he did. Even as fourth-graders, we had begun to look towards the next year with a quiet dread.
Children, however, have a remarkable ability to adjust to almost anything. We adjusted to Mr Suraweera.
His punishments were swift and, to us, endless. Boys were made to stand or kneel for hours. His reprimands were often accompanied by words we had never heard from our teachers before. When his temper broke, a slap across the ear or a heavy blow on the head was not unusual. Anything within reach — a blackboard duster, a piece of chalk, even a pen — could become a weapon.
It was the first time I remember thinking seriously about escape. I wondered whether my parents might send me to another school.
Then came 1966.
We entered Grade Six and were given a new class teacher, Mr Jayamanne.
He seemed to belong to another world.
He was tall and fair, with thick curly hair parted carefully down the middle. He wore wire-rimmed glasses, a spotless white long-sleeved shirt and trousers. A black Parker pen sat neatly in his shirt pocket. After Mr Suraweera, he seemed almost unreal.
Our classroom was still the same old building at the far end. Whatever the roof was made of, and whatever the walls looked like, mattered little to us now. We were having a wonderful time.
For the first time, boys actually looked forward to coming to class.
Mr Jayamanne did have a cane. It rested somewhere in the classroom, a reminder that he could use it if he wished. But he never did.
He didn’t have to.
There was almost no absenteeism. Now eleven years, vibrant boys, who had previously needed fear to keep them in their seats, now came willingly.
He taught us Sinhala, arithmetic, religion and history. But history with Mr Jayamanne was not really history as we knew it. It was storytelling.
Religion was storytelling too.
He taught us the Buddhist Jataka tales, and through those stories I began to understand something of Buddhism. There was an irony in this. Mr Jayamanne was a Catholic.
I remember his voice more than the lessons themselves. He had a quiet eloquence. He could take something from a book and make it feel as though it had happened yesterday.
Art was different.
Art was his calling.
His handwriting on the blackboard was almost calligraphy. He would sometimes sit in class and, while keeping an eye on us, take up his pen and quietly work on a drawing of his own. He encouraged us to draw, but more importantly, he taught us to look.
A still drawing was no longer simply something to copy. He showed us the beauty in it — the shape, the light, the small details that we would otherwise have ignored.
And then there was his sense of fairness.
In those days, the boys who did well were noticed and the boys who struggled could easily disappear into the background. Mr Jayamanne did not allow that. He gave both the same dignity, the same patience and the same encouragement.
He even taught us something about democracy and civic duty.
There were no grand speeches. No textbook lessons about constitutions or elections.
He simply allowed old boys to choose their own class monitor.
For us, this was a small event. Looking back, it was not small at all.
When Grade Six came to an end, we received an unexpected piece of news.
Mr Jayamanne had decided to move with us into Grade Seven.
The boys were delighted.
Almost the entire class moved together, and for another year he remained our teacher.
Two years with the same teacher may not sound remarkable now. To us it was.
Mr Jayamanne had done something that the cane never could. He had made us want to be in the classroom.
I do not remember every sum I did in Grade Six or Grade Seven. I cannot recall every grammar lesson or every page of history.
But I remember Mr Jayamanne.
I remember the stories.
I remember the Jataka tales told by a Catholic teacher.
I remember the black Parker pen.
I remember the drawings appearing quietly on a piece of paper while the rest of us worked.
And I remember that there was a cane in the classroom which he never needed to use.
Perhaps that was his greatest lesson.
Authority does not always have to frighten.
Sometimes, it only has to earn your respect.
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