Sunday , June 20 , 2010 TO SCHOOL ON AN ELEPHANT Sarah Barakat Ullah (née Massey) of the Terai jungle around Dehra Dun was an intrepid schoolteacher of early times. http://www.telegraphindia.com/1100620/jsp/opinion/story_12571585.jsp By the end of the 19th century, school teaching became a favoured occupation for early women professionals. In India, neighbourhood schools as well as those for girls were obviously preferred, often with students and teachers going to school in curtained tongas, carriages and, later, buses. However, there were a few intrepid ones like Sarah Massey, who not only chose to work in a school in the Terai jungle around Dehra Dun, but also to use an elephant as her usual mode of conveyance. When in her eighties (she was born in 1888), Sarah Barakat Ullah (née Massey) hand-wrote memories of her life that have been preserved by her granddaughter, Jamila Verghese. Apart from the written text, there are many photographs that tell the story of this unusual family, cataloguing, among other things, changing sartorial styles, and, of course, Sarah's life with the family's Ford and with Kishan Piyari, the elephant. (snip). --- Harshawardhan_Bosham Nimkhedkar