Break Dancing !

There was a long break and a short break. In school. The short break was 15 minutes. 11.00 o'clock and the bull pens would open. 2000 boys would descend ontp the playgrounds. There was a front ground [ in front of the school ] a back bround [ guess where ? ] and The Rev. Fr. Donnelly Gym. The building was three stories high. Yet 15 minutes was enough to skip to the loo, buy your batata wada ,or wada pav if you had the extra bullion. Then get into a game of tops or marbles or even a quick game of football or hockey. The first bell would go off to reverse the exodus. By the second bell 5 minutes later all 2000 of us would have made it back to our classrooms . Where we'd wait , [ whats the opposite of eagerly ? ] for the teacher to appear.
At 1.00 o'clock the bell for the lunch break would go off. we'd charge down the stairs. Cycle home. Have lunch. Cycle back to school and continue the hockey game that had been brought to an abrupt end in the short break. Some of the rich kids had servants , the others had mothers who would bring a dabba to school for them. They'd repair to the lunch room. Not having to commute for food they'd have a head start over the others at the grounds. The 12 pillars on which cricket wickets could be drawn with chalk would have been appropriated by these fattened little emperors before we'd even been told to wash our hands before eating at home. Soon everybody would be back and on the ground. There were two goal posts, one at either end of the field. Which did service for the ten odd games. Together. So you had to remember the color of the ball of the game you were a part of. Five goalies would all be covering the same goal at the same time. While trying to get control of your ball you had to stay away from the others especially if you were in the sixth standard and the other games were the seventh ,eight ,ninth and tenth standards. There was never any audience participation , because there was no audience. Everybody was a player. The bell to signal the end of the lunch break would go off at 1.55. And 2000 boys who could get from class to playground in 25 seconds flat would take at least 5 minutes to reverse the process. Until 3.45 when the bell signalling the end of the days torture went off. And then we'd better our time of class to playground by three seconds at least.