Recently my wife’s uncle and one of my favorite educators, Mr. Oliver Hakeem, passed away. Mr. Hakeem taught at one of the premier private boarding schools in India, Sherwood College, Nainital, where I was privileged to be his student.
As we look back at our growing years, we can always focus on that one teacher who made a positive impact on our lives. “Ollie” as we affectionately called him (when he was not in hearing distance) was one of those rare teachers.
It was no easy task raising our generation of boys. I went to a boarding school at the age of 5, and like many others, many a night I cried myself to sleep. There were 16 of us who graduated high school together, 13 years later. Ollie was instrumental in playing “mom” and “dad” at a time when we needed him the most. He was stubborn, fair, a strict disciplinarian, and a polished gentleman.
Ollie not only taught us geography, but was instrumental in our metamorphosis from 5-year-old children to 18-year-old young men. He was certainly not easy on us — probably tougher than anyone else. Maybe that is why all 16 of us are scattered all over the world excelling in fields such as medicine, business, education, and science, to name a few.
About 15 years ago he stayed in my home in Tampa. I still called him SIR. I played bartender, as he loved to nurture his Scotch in the evenings, and we talked about Sherwood and the good old days. I spent a day with him in Disney – he was a bigger kid than I could ever be. He hugged me good bye a few days later. Yes it was an awkward moment. That was the last time I saw him.
As he lay dying in a hospital bed in New Delhi, a generation of students whose lives he had touched over a 32-year teaching career at Sherwood rallied around his family to help with medical bills and kept a watch over our other dad. He passed away peacefully leaving a void in the hearts of thousands of students he had raised — not taught, raised.
Yesterday there was a special tribute to him at school as part of our founders day celebration. He was truly a legend and a cornerstone of that great institution.
We will miss you Ollie. Keep watching over us Sir, we still need your guiding hand.
About Hemant Rustogi