Unlearning The Queen’s English: Sweta Vikram
“You are expected to learn at least five new English words every day, memorize their meanings, and use them...
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A Wedding Reception: M. Mushtaque
We were quite unlucky in terms of attending marriages as we were studying in boarding school. And our parents...
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Oak Grove’s Regional History: Anil Edwards
Oak Grove used to be part of the Garhwal and then Nepalese Kingdom when it was annexed from the...
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OG’s Dark Horse: M. Mushtaque
OG’s Dark Horse – Mr. K. Kumar Sir The very first night of OGBS wasn’t as horrible as we...
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मेरा तीरथ: सुदीप बाजपेई
पूछा जो किसी ने, क्या आप पहाड़ों से लौटे हैं? कहा मैंने, हर वर्ष शरीर अपना लिए, इसे आत्मा...
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Sunday Love Story: Kanishka Mallick
Sunday was the day when a make belief world would be created in junior school when prisoners would role-play...
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Farewell Oak Grove: Diptesh Ghosh
Silence!— Mute silence! We stand quietly for our grace. Such silence is terrifying. Never has this grace being given...
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Coach For Life: Kanishka Mallick
We had stepped into the bad world of Senior School where Class VI was the junior most class. We...
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Mrs. Vinodini Joshi: Surabhi Goel
When I think of Oak Grove School, my mind invariably fills with beautiful and nostalgic memories of my childhood...
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Unhappy Endings: Peter Moss
My only link with Oak Grove was the fact that, back in the 1920s, my mother and her four...
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Notes On An OG Visit: Tabish Nawaz
As the scooty entered the meandering road of Mussoorie, the familiar scent of vegetation awakened in me, many memories...
Amit Kumar – My Mentor: Tabish Nawaz
The sad news of Amit Sir has made me to reflect upon my association with him. Though it was brief but it had an element of eternity that brings two souls together in this universe, out of care, brotherly love and devotion. I am indebted to him for helping...
A Living Legend: M. Mushtaque
A LIVING LEGEND: MR.BHATT SIR I entered Boys’ School and was busy in thoughts of entering a new zone, I was surprised to hear my name being called by a teacher in a pleasant friendly tone, It was just 3-4 hours being here and how my name was known,...
FRESH TWEETS
ACORNS, an anthology of 20 stories/essay on life in boarding school is out soon. You may pre-order here: twagaa.com/acorns/ Authors include: @swetavikram @kanishkamallick @ak_sinha @irustima @mangusrinivas @__vC__ @Tabish_Shajar @niksez @shriikant @prabhatranjan__
INSTAGRAM POSTS
LATEST POSTS
A Taste Of Rainbows: Kanishka Mallick
The three of us did not start out as great friends. Junior School rivalry and individual identity was based on class sections. We did not hate each other. We wanted to believe the other section did not exist on earth! PS and I had developed affinity sooner since we...
A Cold Hug: Kanishka Mallick
As winters arrive, inherently, whenever anyone says it’s getting cold, my first reactionary statement is, “we have grown up in the hills, we don’t feel cold!” And then, we quietly walk away and wear multiple layers of light clothing so that we don’t look wearing too much. We get...
Adieu Putu Da: Parthasarathi Paul
Adieu Putu Da alias Shambhu Burman… Memory flashes back to Chakradharpur where my Father was posted in SE Rly in 1959. I was in Class I in a Rly convent. The migratory nature of a rly job had my Dad looking for a good boarding school to ensure continuity...
October Fur: Kanishka Mallick
October has always been like the start line of a race you know you are going to win. It is a month when one starts feeling at ease with everything around. During the day you feel warm but are not sweaty. As the day passes by, you get calmer...
If I Catch You: Kanishka Mallick
The best and the worst part of boarding school are ‘seniors’. This is the set of people who mostly knowingly and sometimes unknowingly make life better or worse for juniors, just like that. We were one of the many boarding schools in Mussoorie. Just like most people who went...
Aaloo Poori Vultures: Kanishka Mallick
Weekends are for that 10 minutes of extra lazing on the bed in the morning, leaving the bed untidy till someone in the house points it out, not thinking about what to wear and perhaps, not checking your phone as the first job of the day! Weekends are also...
Fresh Eyes On OG: Warisha Kuhi
– Warisha Kuhi (2021) This artwork has been shared by Warisha Kuhi with Oakgrovians Young & Old on email.
8 Years in Lockdown: Priyanka Pandey
My siblings and I love to argue, no matter how stupid the topic. I am sure such is the case with all but sometimes, I feel we fight over the dumbest matters. Just yesterday, I was having a heated discussion on whether or not we should send our children...
Lucky Lockdown 6: Kanishka Mallick
Of all options, reform is the best way to correct delinquents and prevent future misdeeds. That is what is the general notion and research shows the same too. Our school administration thought, likewise. Small but healthy doses of kindness and fostering children will aid in nurturing young minds into...
Dear OG, We Will Soon Return: Abhishek Kumar
All the time, we remember our school, Without OG, Life is not cool Our voices will fill every nook & turn Dear OG, we will soon return That splendid March, its sunshine turn The sun that sooths and doesn’t burn We miss the nature, we miss the fun Dear...
1972 Batch Reunion, 2018
Here’s a collection of pictures from the Reunion of 1972 batch, held at Best Western Resort & Country Club,...
On The Jap Cake Trail: Nikhil Kumar
On 1, Turner Road in Dehradun, there is a bakery. It is called Bustan. Sadi, a thirteenth century poet of Shiraz, wrote a book of verses on the lines of Aesop’s Fables, with the same name. In literal Persian, Bustan means a place of smell, and orchard in general...
Hill School: G. Huddleston
Excerpts from CHAPTER XXIII of a book written by Mr. G. Huddleston in 1906, dedicated to his colleagues in East India Railway Company On the purchase of the undertaking by Government on 1st January, 1880, it was, as already explained, found that a sum of over four lakhs of...
Coach For Life: Kanishka Mallick
We had stepped into the bad world of Senior School where Class VI was the junior most class. We lived every moment of ours in virtual fear of offending some senior, knowingly or unknowingly, and the whole batch getting to bear the brunt as a lesson. It sure worked....
Things I Miss: Debarati Chakraborty
Things I miss about Oak Grove That boring morning PT. Miss Farzana waking us up (get up girls ..get up) God her tone was nothing less than a horrifying alarm. Rushing to the wash basin area to brush (actually make turns to brush). Sleeping during morning preps. Getting scolded...
Founders Day 2019
On June 1, 2019, Oak Grove turned 131. For all those who missed out on attending the event, we...
Sculptures From OG Life: Ranajit Shee
This year (2018) on Founders Day, three sculptural masterpieces were unveiled at Oak Grove. Envisaged and created by Mr....
Sculptures From OG Life: Ranajit Shee
This year (2018) on Founders Day, three sculptural masterpieces were unveiled at Oak Grove. Envisaged and created by Mr....
OG Life: Koustav Das
What to write and what not to… About the friends or the school at the hill top, There are many memories to vibe, But they can’t explain the OG life.. Others will say it is a school, But I will say, It is a heaven in the Himalayan roof…...
Maroon Fever: M. Mushtaque
MAROON FEVER GRIPPED GREEN VALLEY Without any doubt, every cricketing fraternity will say that there is no greater rivalry than between Australia and England, or between India and Pakistan. With the passage of time, these series have been the mother of all cricketing events of world cricket. How hard...
Remembering Mr. Bagchi: Kanishka Mallick
The man had only two emotions, He was happy when we were happy, He was angry when we were not up to the mark; His entire life swayed in these two extremes. Man with passion of a crazy artist, Unadulterated love for people like a possessive lover. He would...
अलविदा ओक: संचित चंद ठाकुर
दूर दीवार पर इठला कर बैठी वो गिलहरी.. और हमारी बीती शैतानियाँ.. आसमान में चमकता वो अकेला आदित्य.. और हमारे दिलों में बसी चिंगारियाँ.. हरी-हरी वो मखमली क्यारियाँ.. और दोस्ती में दी कुर्बानियाँ.. रास्तों में पड़े वो मुरझाए पत्ते.. और दोस्तों संग की किलकारियाँ.. ये पेड़, ये पौधें, ये...
The Peace That Was: Shri Krishan Tanwar
In march 1967 it was beginning of spring in Jharipani, parents would return home on the very same day after medical checkup and kit checking in J.S. Dorm. Mrs. Lily Gupta, our HM would issue the admit slip to be surrendered to the M.O.D, we were all made to sit with...
Things I Miss: Debarati Chakraborty
Things I miss about Oak Grove That boring morning PT. Miss Farzana waking us up (get up girls ..get up) God her tone was nothing less than a horrifying alarm. Rushing to the wash basin area to brush (actually make turns to brush). Sleeping during morning preps. Getting scolded...
Subroto Rakshit’s Album
These photographs are from the collection of Subroto Rakshit, Oak Grove School (1971 batch). These were shared by him on his Facebook wall on November 09, 2017.
Oak Grove Times: Sonam Kashyap
It is a poem which I have composed in my last few days in Oak Grove. This poem is dedicated to every Oakgrovian, especially my batch, the batch of 2010-20. Here it goes: The late night talks The long nature walks The class bunking plans And the fancy fair...
ReU Feelings: Shilpi Hastir
The road that led from one home to the other, Excited to meet old friends rather, The journey seemed so beautiful and lively, The birds and trees swaying and giving smiley. The moment had arrived to welcome my friends, Eagerly waiting like a child to relive the trend, The...
Harish Jasani – A Eulogy: Manoj Panikkar
Once in a while, and if we are lucky, we get to spend some time with a certain type of individual. We tuck away that pleasant memory in the deep recesses of our heart, invisible to the outside, like precious objects. They are us in the truest sense and...
Carolyn, your memories brought back memories for me. The tuck boxes – wow – I remember that they were the most important. The gooseberry chutney and jam, mango pickle, tomato dorma, stick-jaw and other goodies that my mother and grandmother used to make or buy for us. Everything had to be equally shared between my brothers and myself. We even […]
A man who taught us never to lose hope, Not to worry much as life was full of scope, His teachings were so perfect that we never mope, His valuable tips for athletic made matters easy to lope. His grip on the subject ‘English’ was flawless, Who am I talking about, any guess, He taught us History with out any […]
Weekends are for that 10 minutes of extra lazing on the bed in the morning, leaving the bed untidy till someone in the house points it out, not thinking about what to wear and perhaps, not checking your phone as the first job of the day! Weekends are also for one extra cup of morning tea, trying to find that […]
My siblings and I love to argue, no matter how stupid the topic. I am sure such is the case with all but sometimes, I feel we fight over the dumbest matters. Just yesterday, I was having a heated discussion on whether or not we should send our children to a boarding school. I was for the motion while my […]
The best and the worst part of boarding school are ‘seniors’. This is the set of people who mostly knowingly and sometimes unknowingly make life better or worse for juniors, just like that. We were one of the many boarding schools in Mussoorie. Just like most people who went to a boarding school, we believed that we were a different […]
We had stepped into the bad world of Senior School where Class VI was the junior most class. We lived every moment of ours in virtual fear of offending some senior, knowingly or unknowingly, and the whole batch getting to bear the brunt as a lesson. It sure worked. We did make mistakes, but never ever repeated them. One thing […]
ESSENTIAL READING
Hill School: G. Huddleston
Excerpts from CHAPTER XXIII of a book written by Mr. G. Huddleston in 1906, dedicated to his colleagues in East India Railway Company On the purchase of the undertaking by Government on 1st January, 1880, it was, as already explained, found that a sum of over four lakhs of...
My Story Of Oak Grove Days: Gaurav Mathur
A puny six year kid being packed to school without consent Was the beginning of life’s best years that I in school had spent It wasn’t simply first sight love, for this I must confess But ten years later, studies done, I knew this place was best Today it’s...
On The Jap Cake Trail: Nikhil Kumar
On 1, Turner Road in Dehradun, there is a bakery. It is called Bustan. Sadi, a thirteenth century poet of Shiraz, wrote a book of verses on the lines of Aesop’s Fables, with the same name. In literal Persian, Bustan means a place of smell, and orchard in general...
Ma’am Bhaskar: Nikhil Kumar
It was after twenty years, in the year Big Ma’am passed away, that I started eating eggs again. My relationship with eggs had ended soon after I joined Oak Grove (OG) in 1995. On the first day at OG many of us were ushered inside Class 3B, which, as...
Unhappy Endings: Peter Moss
My only link with Oak Grove was the fact that, back in the 1920s, my mother and her four siblings had all been educated there. I admitted as much when I presented myself at the gates to this ancient but prestigious school in 1979, some 91 years after its...
Olympic Hockey Champions from Mussoorie
Mussoorie schools – the breeding ground of Olympic hockey champions Indian hockey owes much of its success during its formative years to schools of Mussoorie, which have nurtured as much as 10 Olympic hockey gold medal winners between 1928 and 1936. In the recently concluded Olympics at Rio we...
The Life Story of Bon Ross: Part 3
Oak Grove School This school was owned and operated by the East Indian Railway. The locality was called Jharipani – meaning cold water. It was situated up in the Himalayas just below Mussoorie at about 4500 feet above sea level. This arrangement made it more comfortable for students to...
The ABC Of OG: Diptesh Ghosh
A: Arrival: For the start of the new season, we would arrive just before the monsoons, from the burning plains like refugees from a humanitarian crisis. The new-comers would have absolutely no idea what they were up against, and the old-timers would be eager to get back to their...
Olga’s Story (1929-1935): Paul McGinlay
My mother, Olga Vallint was born in Mogulsarai in 1920. Her father Alan was a yard supervisor with East India Railway and her mother Ida (Morrison) worked in the ticket office at Howrah station. Alan was regularly moved to different depots around the Calcutta area and decided that the...
A Mighty Oak: Sheila Cameron
A Tribute to Patrick John Lear Corbett (1938-2011) On 8 March 1938 in the growing dusty railway colony of Moradabad, UP, amid red brick homes, a railway institute, churchyard and bustling bazaars, a bonnie baby boy was born to young Denis and Charlotte Corbett. They named him Patrick John Lear and prayed...
EXPRESSIONS
Dear OG, We Will Soon Return: Abhishek Kumar
All the time, we remember our school, Without OG, Life is not cool Our voices will fill every nook & turn Dear OG, we will soon return That splendid March, its sunshine turn The sun that sooths and doesn’t burn We miss the nature, we miss the fun Dear...
My Twin Amigos of OG: M. Mushtaque
Life is meaningless and purposeless If you never had buddies in the school, I can’t recall the day when I met these TWO who were calm and cool. One bumped into my life as JS Dorm partner another met at Boys School, they were cricketers of next caliber- one...
मेरे अपने: सुदीप बाजपेई
पता नहीं आपकी आँखों पे ऐनक है या चश्मा, आठ साल के बच्चे को सब्ज़ी परोसते हुए, ‘मुन्ना सर’ आपने पूछा नहीं कि हिन्दू है या मुसलमाँ। चार सौ मीटर दौड़ने के बाद हाथ कमर पे गए ही थे कि एक डाँट सुनाई दी। “सीधा खड़ा रह, थक गया…”...
My First Love, My Oak Grove: Vipul Rana
In the mountains, Amid the clouds, Stands my Oak Grove, Tall and proud. With a legacy a century and quarter old, Crown of the Queen mountain, A heaven, truth be told. Seeing those majestic walls, As a child, I was utterly blown,With clouds showering rains of joy, It’s an...
A Confidant Buddy: M. Mushtaque
Deepak Bist Smiling face with hope and all kinds of support, You came to me and stood beside me as destroyer escort, That was the first time when I knew You and got to consort, That was the beginning of our amity which would never thwart. Watching cricket matches...
Let’s Wish Madness For Them: Tabish Nawaz
“Who goes to the hills, goes to his mother….” – Rudyard Kipling They once lived in a mountain their feet still saunter with the care they once had for a city that glowed beneath them. Even today when they speak their eyes twinkle like those old times up there...
Mr. Xenodochial: M. Mushtaque
MR. XENODOCHIAL: Puneet Monga Sir How I wish I could go back to OG towards the end of the 20th century, Then I remember it was the year when I was just a new-born baby, Only to meet one of the true spirited Oakgrovians if I would have been...
The Compelling Number Cruncher: M. Mushtaque
THE COMPELLING NUMBER-CRUNCHER: Ma’am Kusum Kamboj Juggling with mathematical formula is always fun-filled bizarre, I never found any better math teacher than Ma’am Kamboj in my memoir, The way she taught us calculations are still fresh and acts as lodestar, Having fun with mental math under her supervision made...
Reminiscing: Ruchi Lata Pandey
July 15, 2019 I had spent a better part of my three years at grad school preparing. Not for interviews for a job but preparing so that I could get the opportunity of sitting in the Cardinal Gracias Media Resource Centre at St. Xavier’s College, Mumbai. As I finally...
Ode To OG Walls: Manoj Panikkar
I have always had a fascination for the hard stone walls of OG. Here is an awkward ode to them: Tender fingers caress me, stone, unyielding. Projections, troughs, hard with the ages, cushion like, soft. Mute, yet vocal, whispering back, a thousand tales. July tears, smudged, by August rains....
WEEK SUMMARY TITLES
The three of us did not start out as great friends. Junior School rivalry and individual identity was based...
As winters arrive, inherently, whenever anyone says it’s getting cold, my first reactionary statement is, “we have grown up...
Adieu Putu Da alias Shambhu Burman… Memory flashes back to Chakradharpur where my Father was posted in SE Rly...
October has always been like the start line of a race you know you are going to win. It...