If you think the streets of India are crazy, wait until you meet the teenagers.

 

My first day at the American School of Bombay was crazy, busy and long.  The day began strangely as I left my hotel to meet one of the administrators, Shabbi, to share a car ride.  On my way out, a nice(r) car pulls up, says in a thick accent “Sage Turk?”, and then “American School”.  I ask him if he is with Shabbi, he does the indian sort of half committed, passive head wobble (which means yes), so I get in an off we go.  We arrive at the school with no problem, until the security guard calls up Shabbi, who has no clue who the driver was.  We call another administrator....nothing.  So the mystery of the driver remains.  At least I wasn’t kidnapped.

 

The school itself is a state of the art facility.  It has 5 stories, a glass facade, and an actual, swimmable, swimming pool.  Every single kid has their own laptop (K-12, 750 students total).  The classes are small, and tuition is 30k a year...per kid.  They’re privileged, but pretty good.  Only about half are Indian...every other ethnicity is represented as well.  

 

I started today teaching 4th graders, then on to middle schoolers, then highschoolers.