school's started

School started today, and frankly, I’m not as dismayed as I had anticipated I’d be. I mean, I’d expected to be all, Oh no, why couldn’t school have started next week, but I only aware of being visited by such thoughts at the very beginning. I guess the fact that we had a free period today (a free period equals an hour and fifteen minutes’ worth of free time, and that’s saying something) improved my mood greatly and allowed me to catch up on some of the sleep that I was deprived of. In addition to that, one of my good friends has returned from her vacation, and although she’s not in the same class as I am, and I now have closer company to spend break time with. I mean there are other peeps with whom I’m on speaking terms: people who come from schools affiliated to the same board as my old school is (ICSE), and the Central Board. Yes, I have a superiority complex and a sense of elitism with regard to this whole board thing, and I look upon people from the State Board (something that is, in my opinion, an inferior board to the ICSE and Central Board) with a condescending eye, and don’t generally socialize with them. Not at all, in fact. It’s ironic that my school is officially affiliated with the State Board. A good point is that few people actually give a shit about this board thing, because my course is an integrated one and it gives less importance to this whole board shit as compared to things like the IIT Joint Entrance Exam and the SAT (the latter of which is my primary goal). So yeah: It doesn’t matter that my school identifies itself as being a school of the State Board. Getting back to the nub, I’m happy to report that a good half of the population of the school comprises people from the two prestigious boards. In a country like this, where good English is so hard to come by, one relishes every moment of hearing someone speak the language correctly. The standard of English in the ICSE and Central Boards is high, and since it’s usually the good students who score well who go to this school, one can safely assume that they paid adequate attention in their English classes, and the standard of their spoken English supports this. Yeah, I’m extremely narrow-minded when it comes to English, and am the first person to judge a person based on his language. Whenever I see a person on TV—usually a famous person, who makes the headlines every now and then—the first question I ask is, Does he/she know English? Seems awfully arrogant of me, I know. Yet despite it all, if there’s one thing that is severely in need of attention, it’s my diction. I am told often, and am aware of this myself, that my speech is incredibly unclear. I know that I speak too fast, and I guess that comes from reading aloud too often, and I’m working on that, or at least trying to, but then I notice that when I try too hard to speak slowly, I end up with this annoying drawl. I mean when I’m with my close friends and all, who are, I think, accustomed to the way I speak, I don’t pay much attention to how I speak. It’s when I’m with strangers, especially those who aren’t exactly known for their prowess in English, that I become conscious of what I’m saying—it usually takes a blank look to appear on their face in place of what should have been the appropriate facial expression to drive home this point—and begin working on my diction. I still have a lot to achieve in the way of clarity. I mean, it’s not just the accent, because people seem to understand the accent of some of my friends. I mean they don’t completely not understand what I’m saying, but all the same, it takes them several moments to register. So here’s my plan: Step 1—Speak slowly (slower than I do now, at least); Step 2—Speak clearly (this would need a little working on, I guess); Step 3—I don’t know; but there should be one, probably something that’ll become clear to me in the course of time. And with this, I’ll wrap this post up.