[PGD] in brackets

Open brackets.

I step out of Little India and step into the recent past. PGD has an all too familiar sound for those of us who know Strathmore School in Nairobi, Kenya. It stands for Prize Giving Day, and today 29th September, happens to be PGD.

It's next to impossible to omit from my memory the PGDs I have attended as a student, those as a past student, and in the last 8 or so years, the PGDs I took part in as a teacher at "Strath" (as we familiarly call it).

PGD is in a sense a day for parents, teachers and students. It's a day for parents to proudly see their children assembled before them and staging an extravaganza of talent in the form of skits, plays, rhymes. It's a day for the teachers to reflect on the 9 month's worth of work – “Teaching is worth it!” I many-a-time told myself. It's a day for the students to don their navy blue blazers and bask in the glory of Nairobi's sun as their names are read out to collect prizes for participation in class, academic merit, sporting excellence, extra-curricular activities like The Scroll Magazine and Scroll Digital ...

Strath is a place where parents, teachers and students integrate in quite a unique way. Perhaps it’s because the inspirational spirit of the School came from St Josemaria Escriva. This spirit has placed the School in a class of its own.

Close brackets.

[Pics: The parents always have a good laugh as they encourage the little ones to put the boxes in the right place - the kids learn to work in teams from the moment they join the School. The "blue blazers" in the last pic made up the editorial team of the School Magazine that year marketed as Scroll 205]
Kd