The wall was white, it was so white that I was being hesitant to disturb its whiteness. And like an elephant’s body it was wide, so wide I had to take many steps back to see the wholeness of the wall. That was the wall that had to be painted. I lined up all my art gears(I got enamel paints for the job and trust me I had no idea how difficult those paints could be) and pulled up my sleeves; then I held the brush, dipped it into the enamel box and with all the nervous confidence I tainted the wall with an uneven  brown stroke of the brush.

My hands were still and calm but my mind and heart were high on sugar I guess as they were burning up the insides. May be they were not enjoying the constant gaze of the people around judging every stroke I make. To worsen things, the enamel started dripping from places like a smeared kajol.  It was a nightmare, I tell you. I regretted for ever  nominating myself to paint the wall, I cursed my excitement then. After a while , I soaked the brush with some greens and then dabbing the wall like a child , then I added some baby greens on edges. Those green brought freshness in me and I got into my zone. This is how my art project started in school.

It all started with that white wall of ECD room and is now contaminating the hall ways, pillars, stair cases, old racks, cupboards and any other space. I have this compulsion of doing all the job; it’s like I need to get it done all by myself. This painting project taught me great lesson – to have helps.

I am so grateful to my co-fellows – Dipa and Prakash for being so supportive and painting whatever they could. Dipa had never painted before and yet is always willing to give it a shot at painting. These two people have supported me with all my crazy cravings to paint whatever my eyes spy.

My greatest achievement would be working with the students (more like they working and me just observing). Also, I got smart I guess; I learnt to work smart and not hard. Every time I was painting, the students always asked if they could and I said “No.” cause I feared that they would ruin it. After a while I let few of them help me around with the painting work and lo, everyone would just grab the resting brush and at least for once smear the colour anywhere. The help started with coloring the old cupboards in creamy hues and continued with turning the white hallway into flashy colours screaming for attention.

May be even the god wanted our school to be colourful or may be it was just a mere coincidence. There were colours coming from everywhere. Rotaract Club of Sainbu Bhainsepati left few colours then we had the Korean team leave us with more colours. I was like Hallelujah!!! It fuelled up my work. But no matter what my favourites are always acrylics; those distemper paints are dull as foggy morning and enamel, despite being shiny, are unmanageable like a bad hair.

My favourite is the white shadow work in that neon green wall; it feels clean and clear. You should gaze at the wall during evening and you can hear the chirps of the birds, it looks so lively. As we were working on this, I got asked “you are not leaving it plain white right?” and I was “Ummm… yes I am. This is pretty much it.” I was literally yelling to everyone “THIS is supposed to be this simple. Other colours would not complement THIS GREEN.

The curves of the wall were white but all sprinkled with dust. As we had spare colours that would be damaged if not used soon, we thought about using it to turn the hallway all colourful. My energy was all low and I needed big time help. So, I asked the students to help me with it. All that it took was one simple instruction “Fill the boxes with alternate colours.” And poof! It was done in a while.

Here is the sea world which is taking me forever to complete. Every little kid would ask me what that yellow thing was and then I got tired of answering “Submarine”. So, one day I answered it was a fish and the dolphin was an aeroplane and then what the little kid did was teach that to other little kids and I laughed and said it was wrong. What she did next was, hit me in embarrassment . Other ramailo comment would be “Why is there a mushroom inside the water?”

Thank the person who made the staircase. It seems like the staircase itself volunteered to be of help by having eleven steps. Doesn’t it look pretty?

Here is the recent pillar week chart.