A few years in the past, once I was at school, I had a instructor who discovered it very tough to be variety to me. We had simply began the brand new tutorial yr and it was our second or third arithmetic class with him. Within the first couple of courses, he requested college students to return up and remedy issues on the blackboard. Now, I wasn’t particularly horrible at maths, however the prospect of getting up in entrance of a whole class put me in panic mode. Let’s simply say I at all times knew that I couldn’t be a politician.

When it was my flip to go to the entrance of the classroom, I couldn’t consider the query and muddled the entire thing up. He checked out me and mentioned, ‘It’s a good factor you could have a pleasing wanting face as a result of right here [pointing to his head] it’s all empty.’ Everybody laughed, together with me. For the subsequent couple of months, even once I labored up the braveness to reply a query and put my hand up, he would level to his head and mouth ‘empty’, and choose another person to reply. I do know I tousled the primary time, however I didn’t perceive the necessity for this fixed mocking.

Quickly, December arrived and with it our winter holidays. I used to be packed off to Phuphee’s home for a couple of months. On the day I arrived it began snowing — slightly dusting at first, adopted by a pause of some hours after which, a mild, steady snowfall that carried on for days.

Quickly every thing was lined in a heavy white blanket. Each morning we’d see the white pile get taller and taller, till it reached the bottom flooring home windows. We performed exterior making snowmen and girls and having snow fights, till chilblains lined our palms and toes, which made them damage and itch.

Phuphee rubbed mustard oil on our palms and toes within the evenings, lined them with woollen socks and mittens that she had knitted, and informed us by no means to set foot exterior within the snow once more. We, after all, didn’t pay attention and the entire course of was repeated once more the subsequent night, together with the threats and admonitions.

In my second week there, I remembered the discouraging phrases of my instructor and I promised myself that I’d cease going out and losing time. As a substitute, I’d throw myself into turning into so proficient in maths that he would don’t have any selection however to cease mocking me. So, for the subsequent month, I’d get up early within the bitter chilly and work, taking breaks just for the toilet and meals. In the future once I was sitting in Phuphee’s room, she got here in with a bowl of scorching firni (semolina cooked in milk and sugar topped with nuts and saffron strands).

‘Eat it earlier than it will get chilly,’ she mentioned.

She sat down and requested why I had stopped taking part in with my cousins. I informed her of my predicament and the way I used to be decided to win my instructor’s approval. She bought up and opened the window. A blast of chilly air swept into the room.

‘Look, it’s snowing once more,’ she mentioned, scooping a handful of freshly fallen snow and placing it on the tray. She dried her palms on her pheran, closed the window and sat down. She lit two cigarettes and smoked for a couple of minutes.

‘, maetonji [the English missionary nurse who ran a local clinic in the village] informed me that snow is made up of snowflakes. Tiny, small flakes that clump collectively to kind the blanket you see exterior,’ she mentioned. ‘Every snowflake is completely different. No two are the identical. Are you able to think about that? And, to ensure that us to see the person flakes, we must get a particular glass.’

I didn’t perceive why she was telling me about snowflakes.

‘Whose fault is it that we can’t see the snowflake? Us, for not possessing sharper eyes, or the snowflake itself?’ she requested.

‘I don’t know,’ I replied, ‘I suppose the defect lies with our eyes.’

‘Sure, it’s our eyes that can’t see the fantastic thing about a person flake. Do you assume the snowflake is any much less stunning or highly effective just because we’re incapable of seeing it?’

‘Boaz, myoan gash [listen, light of my eyes], everybody round you won’t be able to see you the best way you’re. Most of us are restricted by our personal defects. The essential factor to recollect is that simply because somebody can’t see you for who you’re, it doesn’t diminish you in any means. You stay the identical. Now end your firni,’ she mentioned and left.

I considered her phrases as I spooned the creamy combination into my mouth. I completed the firni, closed my books and went exterior to play with my cousins. A month later, again within the classroom, I realised my instructor was precisely the identical. I, then again, had modified. I labored onerous however stopped looking for his approval and even kindness. There was energy in understanding that I used to be useful and distinctive even when he was unable to see it.

As a substitute of concentrating on his unkindness I selected, just like the snowflake, to delight in my very own individuality and energy. I took my last examinations and did effectively, each to my shock and his.

Saba Mahjoor, a Kashmiri dwelling in England, spends her scant free time considering life’s vagaries.