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5. Wishing always to study “a bit more” and with her father slowly getting used to her urge for more education, Santosh passed the high school examinations and went to Jaipur. She joined Maharani College and got a room in Kasturba Hostel. Santosh remembers, “Kasturba Hostel faced the Aravalli Hills. I used to watch villagers from my room, going up the hill and suddenly vanishing after a while. One day I decided to check it out myself. I found nobody except a few mountaineers. I asked if I could join them. To my pleasant surprise, they answered in the affirmative and motivated me to take to climbing.”
6. Then there was no looking back for this determined young girl. She saved money and enrolled in a course at Uttarkashi’s Nehru Institute of Mountaineering. “My college semester in Jaipur was to end in April but it ended on the nineteenth of May. And I was supposed to be in Uttarkashi on the twenty-first. So, I did not go back home; instead, I headed straight for the training. I had to write a letter of apology to my father without whose permission I had got myself enrolled at Uttarkashi.”
Explanation:
Santosh did not stop after completing her school education, unlike most other girls from the village. She always wanted a bit more when it came to her studies. She enrolled herself in Maharani College, Jaipur. Her father had by now gotten used to her desires and the fact that no matter what they said, she would chase her dreams. The girl who had to nearly threaten her parents to study in Delhi now travelled and stayed in Jaipur, which was the capital of Rajasthan. She stayed in a hostel called Kasturba Hostel near her college. Her room in the hostel happened to be facing the Aravalli range, a mountain range that started in Delhi and passed through Haryana and Rajasthan.
Aravalli range
She saw the villagers going up the mountain and climbing down the other end of the range. It looked like they were disappearing to her. She decided to check what was the reality as she was curious and went to the range all by herself. When she had gone there, she could only see a group of mountaineers, who generally ascend tall ranges and mountains. It is considered one of the most refreshing outdoor activities. It was a turning point in Santosh's life as it was the first time she explored mountaineering with them. They even motivated her to climb along with them.
Mountaineers
Since this opened a new window to her, Santosh, who always wanted to go an extra mile when it came to exploring, decided to take it up as a course. She saved money when she was in college and enrolled in the Nehru Institute of Mountaineering in Uttarkashi, Uttarakhand. There are \(4\) recognised mountaineering colleges in India that teach all about outdoor safety, wilderness navigation, rock craft, safety measures etc. Mountaineering is an ideal course for people who want to explore and find themselves in nature. She was supposed to join the course on May twenty-first. But her college course, which was supposed to end in April, got extended to May nineteenth, which did not give her any time to plan for the mountaineering course. But she did not give up, citing not informing her parents as a reason. Instead, she wrote a letter to her father seeking an apology and went straight ahead to join the course in Uttarkashi.
Uttarkashi
Meaning of difficult words:
| S.No | Words | Meaning |
1 | Urge | A strong desire to do something |
2 | Affirmative | Agreeing or consenting to a request |
3 | Vanishing | To disappear without trace |
4 | Ascend | Go up or climb |
5 | Determined | Having exceptional will power |
6 | Apology | Feeling sorry |
Reference:
National Council of Educational Research and Training (2006). Beehive. Reach for the Top (pp.99-109). Published at the Publication Division by the Secretary, National Council of Educational Research and Training, Sri Aurobindo Marg, New Delhi.
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