Revolution in Education
I grew up in Rishi Valley. It was the first school founded by Jiddu
Krishnamurti. It is nestled in the Deccan Plateau in Andhra Pradesh a state in
the south of India. When I first arrived, my parents told me that the school
was set up to find out if we could liberate intelligence and thereby create a
revolution in education. Some years later, I overheard a conversation between
Mark Lee, my Junior School Teacher and Achyut Patawardhan a friend of Jiddu
Krishnamurti. They were in deep conversation after an intense Staff Meeting
where Krishnamurti had spoken insistently to the teachers about ‘preparing the
ground to liberate intelligence from the authority of the known’. So strange, I
thought, what a task, but I resolved to watch my mind and report back to the
community in case I came across anything interesting.
The school estate had been laid out according to a precise plan, my father
said, with the playing fields at the heart of the compound. The valley was
surrounded by ancient blue hills resplendent in the sun and sprawling with
massive granite boulders weathered by wind and water for millions of years. The
scene was beyond my powers of description.
I lived with my father on the outskirts of the estate where the property spread
out over acres of vegetable gardens, fields of lucerne, pastures for the cattle,
orchards, mango groves, tamarinds and the casuarinas trees which had been
planted as a wind-break along a ridge of land beyond our back yard. At nights I
could hear the wind whistling through these trees seemingly in tune with the
great band of stars in the Milky Way streaming light from the vast depths of the
sky.
The accommodation blocks for boarders and the teaching staff were built around
the playing fields. There were cricket grounds, tennis courts, football yards,
courts for playing hockey, hand ball and numerous other sports. The school
buildings were built amidst green lawns and flowering shrubs. Tall trees lined
the roads which criss-crossed through the whole compound. So most of the
children lived within a tight knit community and few of them had the freedom to
range across the valley as I did.
Our house was at the end of a long track that ran past the Old and New Guest
House. It was an ancient track covered in soft fine dust. It wound through the
valley and on towards a settlement called Thettu at the base of the western
hills. On this track I met many visitors from around the world who came to the
talks with Jiddu Krishnamurti. I often walked with them to and from school and
listened to their wonderings about his philosophy and his radical approach to
education. I also walked with the local people whose ancestors had lived in the
valley for centuries. I played with their children since many of the farm hands
came from the surrounding villages.
My Ayah was a widow. She had two children. They kept me company while she
cleaned the house, washed clothes, swept the yard and took care of the garden.
My father was away most of the time working at the farm seven days a week,
tending to his ‘beloved’ herd of cows. He had over fourteen people working at
the dairy helping him feed and clean the cows before milking them daily. They
started at 4 am and finished at 6 pm. His cows were the most beautiful herd I
had ever seen. Their large placid eyes serenely reflected the universe and were
surrounded by dense long lashes.
So in the midst of this ancient landscape I found myself on intimate terms with
people from diverse backgrounds. There were many guests at the school. Some
stayed at the Guest House for weeks, others for a few days. They came from
Hollywood, from the Himalayas, from Europe and far flung places like Canada and
Australia. I heard about their ventures, passions and their transitions through
life.
They spoke to me about establishing a Kibbutz in Israel. They spoke of
Malaysia and modern cities like Singapore. They agonized about the poverty in
third world countries like India. They talked about the politics and covert
operations between Russia and America. They spoke of apartheid in Africa and
the agonizing war in Vietnam. No matter where they came from though, they were
concerned about the world of man. They were looking for answers to the problem
of human existence. They were looking to see if education in an idyllic setting
like ours, removed from the grip of modern civilization would provide useful
answers.
It was intriguing to walk beside a bullock cart with an engineer who built jet
planes and listen to him musing about the craftsmanship that went into
hand-carving wheels out of local blocks of wood. It was strange to hear about
Piaget and Pavlov, Einstein and radical scientists like David Bohm. The tug of
war between the East and the West, the war in Vietnam, the tainted politics of
apartheid in South Africa and the Chinese communist encroachment over the
Himalayas infused my mind as I walked back and forth from school.
Other than watching the movement of thought from an early age and observing the
impact of labels upon my mind, I had no idea that I would someday walk free from
the cloud of illusion that was slowly gathering in my mind. I could see that
reflecting on the movement of thought helped me clarify my mind. So I kept up
with the inquiry. I could see that my sequence of thoughts stirred a sense of
anticipation, expectation, fear and desire.
I was so enamored by my own imagination. It was such an absorbing past-time,
such entertainment. Seeing how easily I could dwell on fantasy, speculate and
draw on it struck a note of caution at the time. However, I had no idea that I
would rely upon my early impressions of thought throughout my life, or that our
vigilance would free my mind from the stifling grip of conditioning. Years
later, I realized that this was exactly what Jiddu Krishnamurti intended for us
when he set about engaging us in dialogue into the nature of thoughts during his
annual visits to our school.
Geetha Waters
Feedback:
geethawaters@gmail.com
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