Stepping Stones: A Passage out of India

By Felicity Simmons

Only in retrospect did Felicity realize that walking along mud banks that separated paddy fields in rural India and sitting at the local well for hours on end observing the villagers - who were also observing her - was somewhat incongruous for a European child with light coloured eyes. Likewise, being placed in an orphanage at the age of one when her mother died. Felicity had an unusual way out from her deprivation at the age of twelve when she joined the Deccan Queen railway journey at an elite girls' boarding school run by nuns from Oxford, England graduating with a Cambridge High School Certificate at the age of eighteen. This story traces the stepping stones from the foundling home in Bombay to Felicity stepping off a P&O ship in Sydney, Australia. The timeframe of the story is in the 1930's. 1940's and 1950's, a time of great change as India transitioned from a British colony to an independent nation.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Balboa Press AU
• Release date: Jan 24, 2022
• ISBN: 9781982293635

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Copyright © 2022 Felicity Simmons.

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ISBN: 978-1-9822-9362-8 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-9822-9363-5 (e)

Balboa Press rev. date:  07/11/2022

CONTENTS

Dedication

Declaration

Prologue

Chapter 1     St Christopher’s Home

Chapter 2     St Peter’s School, Khandala

Chapter 3     Early School Holidays

Chapter 4     Kalyan - A Retrograde Step

Chapter 5     Leaving Kalyan

Chapter 6     St. Mary’s High School, Poona: SMS

Chapter 7     The Culture and Music Tradition at SMS

Chapter 8     Long School Holidays

Chapter 9     My Final Year at SMS

Chapter 10   My Last Month in India

Chapter 11   The Voyage to Australia

Afterwards: A Rich Cultural Heritage

Kalyan – Again!

A Poem To My Father

About The Author

Photographs

Notes

DEDICATION

To my son, Gary and daughter, Catherine for their moral support. They heard the stories in bits and pieces whilst growing up. Now it is here for them in more order. They will recognise many of the stories and my strong belief that education is a privilege and not a right, even in advanced economic countries - including Australia. I am so grateful that this concept is now embedded in our society and how education is now available to all citizens through taxes and social mores.

To my three elder sisters Jane, Lillian and Angela who were with me on this journey some of the way. Also, to their families and the next generation coming along all of whom have enjoyed loving family environments and far more educational opportunities than my sisters and I did.

To Sister Phoebe, the Sister Superior whose persistence was instrumental in me (and my sisters) being given the opportunity to step back into school - and receive the best available education in India at that time.

To my school friends Bacha and Bella. The internet has enabled us to reconnect. Their assistance and feedback about those far away times we spent together was invaluable. Who would have thought when we all said goodbye way back in 1955 that such things could happen!

To my valued Australian friends. Although the time and place of the memoir was new, your feedback was also most welcome.

DECLARATION

This story is my personal memoir which is therefore not quite the same as any of my sisters. Like many children, as an adult, I didn’t get around to asking my father, whilst he was alive, about his family, his youth and our real mother. Over the years, I asked my eldest sister Jane to clarify aspects of our early existence. She was seven years older than me so her memories of the first decade of our family were more reliable.

During my youth, very little was said about my mother except some derogatory remarks by my stepmother. I realised in my forties that I would need to talk to my Dad’s brother, Uncle Ernest, and his wife, Aunty Margery, in order to get an adult perspective of my father’s early married life and gain some background information as to why he sank to abject poverty. At the time of my recording these conversations Uncle Ernest was far less coherent, so I was grateful to my Aunty Margery - whose mind was still agile – for filling in some of the gaps in my knowledge of our family background.

I have referred to towns and cities in the names of the time with their current name in brackets at first mention. There were many changes of town and road names when the Republic of India came into being. The two towns especially relating to this story are Bombay (Mumbai) and Poona (Pune).

Also, I have referred to most people by their actual names – except for one family - because, as is told in the story, I experienced some problems during my school holiday stays with them. I do not wish to embarrass any of that family’s descendants with what occurred. Besides, the circumstances of the actions were surreptitious so they would be hard to substantiate!

PROLOGUE

I was born and bred in India. My father was Italian and my mother Anglo Indian. My father was widowed at the age of 37 being left to care for four girls: my eldest sister, Jane aged eight; Lillian aged five; Angela aged four and me, aged one. My three sisters were sent to an orphanage called St. Christopher’s Home in Lonavla. A very small hill station East of Bombay. I was sent to a foundling home (orphanage for babies) somewhere in Bombay. A year later, aged two, I was sent to St Christopher’s home.

As an adult – and lots more stepping stones - my work led me into adult education in Australia and later in America and China. It involved many meetings and discussions on issues such as the development of national industry workplace standards and their use in education and training. An assignment I found particularly intriguing was teaching high flyers in the Chinese mining industry the subtleties of communicating effectively in English with their Western counterparts.

Often, the image of my ten-year-old self sitting at a well would flash through my mind. It served as a touchstone of the journey (the stepping stones) that led me to be leading such meetings and classes and to me giving my very best to education.

CHAPTER 1

St Christopher’s Home

When one is very young life happens! Life is! Rich children accept being driven around in limousines without pondering how lucky they are. Orphans don’t dwell on their sad plight at sleeping in dormitories or, perhaps, how lucky they are to be in an institution instead of on the street.

When I was born in March 1937 my parents had been married eight years during which time they had five children - four girls and one boy. The girls survived and the boy died within four months of his birth. More than likely my arrival was unwelcome - just another mouth to feed and a heavy drain on my mother’s health and still no boy child.

A boy was born in 1938. He died within a month of his birth. Maybe there is some truth that girl babies are hardier than boys. My mother died a few months later. I was sent to a foundling home St Christopher’s Home (an orphanage for babies) and my three elder sisters were sent to another orphanage (referred to as The Home) in a place called Lonavla, West of Bombay. It was a very small town in the Ghats (hills) West of the Eastern sea board of the Peninsular region of India.

What’s in a name?

When I was two years old I was transferred to The Home. My father must not have accompanied me in this handover. If he had, I feel sure what happened on that occasion would not have occurred. Much later, my big sister Jane filled me in concerning my arrival there.

My three sisters, all strangers to me, were the welcoming committee having been summoned to the office by Mrs Thompson, the Principal.

Mrs Thompson asked me: What is your name?

I replied: Bertha.

She then asked me: What is your second name?

Jane replied Felicity.

Mrs Thompson decreed: We shall call her Felicity.

Thus, without any formality, either religious or civil, I had a name change - I grew up being known as Felicity Malfiggiani.

The Home was a conglomeration of large and small buildings and outhouses set in an old orchard. The main building had two stories. At the entrance, on the ground floor, was the Principal’s office on one side and an administrative office on the other. The residents would only see this area if they were summoned by the Principal for misdemeanours or if they were lucky enough to have a visitor. The senior’s dormitory went the whole length of the floor above it and overflowed to an extension. Dormitories for the juniors and kindergarten-aged children were separated into other adjoining buildings. The dining room was near the kitchen as were the servants’ quarters. There were several covered passageways which connected the buildings integrating them into a functional whole. This was especially important in the monsoon season when there were three months of torrential rain. The hilly Ghats were particularly prone to spectacular thunderstorms and rain.

The neglected orchard was our playground and the source of dry leaves and twigs to stoke the primitive boiler that was our only source of hot water. Collecting these sticks for fuel was part of our daily routine. I loved the smell of wood smoke wafting on the air and even now I find the smell of wood fires very soothing.

The major patrons of The Home were the members of the British Women’s Association (BWA). Most of these women were wives of expatriates (Expats) working in Bombay. Not only did they give money to maintain The Home, they also endowed niceties such as fruit, cakes, sweets, and their children’s castoff clothes. The nice dresses were stored in large trunks and hauled out for fitting sessions on special occasions.

From our youthful perspective, Mrs Thompson was very old. Her sternness terrified us. In retrospect, she was a Charles Dicken’s archetype. I particularly remember her straight back, her tendency to wear pink and grey, her head held high and her very English accent. In hindsight, she must have been a very caring person to have given her life to run an orphanage in an isolated hill station in India. This very proper, highly educated English woman, by virtue of her position, was a surrogate mother to all the children.

We four Malfiggiani sisters were an enigma not only because of our name but because of our fair skin and light-coloured eyes. We were luckier than others at the orphanage since we knew we had each other although we were separated into our age groups for activities and placed in different dormitories.

Visitors for the young people at The Home were a treat but for those who were bereft of all relations this could never be. Mrs Thompson, therefore, encouraged the visitors to bring a large bag of sweets which could be shared later with all the children in her care. When, very occasionally, our father visited us,we were allowed the privilege of being in the orchard with him. On those rare Saturday afternoons, we were given nice clothes from the communal chest prior to descending the staircase to the Principal’s office. When our father left, Jane was given the responsibility of handing over to Mrs Thompson the obligatory bag of sweets.

On one occasion, before I was five years old, we had a visit from our Aunt Maude and her family. She was my mother’s elder sister. Her married name was Royal. A joke went around the orphanage that the Malfiggiani sisters had had a visit from the Royal family. I must have been the only one who didn’t get it. I was more concerned at being the butt of a joke. Jane explained that Aunt Maude had come to say goodbye because she and her family were leaving India for England. All I can remember of that event was constantly trying to wriggle off my Aunty’s lap as she kept pulling me back to restrain me. We didn’t have much to do with her and her family although, I learned later, she and her husband owned and ran a dairy farm in a place called Kirkee which was near the large regional centre of Poona.

My time at St. Christopher’s Home coincided with the emergence of Western economies from the ‘Great Depression’ followed soon after by the start of the Second World War. During its two-hundred-year occupation of India Great Britain maintained a high-profile military presence. Several British army battalions were stationed across the country and naval bases existed on the coast. Bombay was a thriving port for both naval and commercial vessels, including passenger ships – air travel, in those days, was not financially viable for the public. Indian regiments were trained in the British tradition and many of them played an active part in supporting the ‘war effort’ with military facilities, services and troops.

Tucked away in the Ghats we girls were protected from the tragedies of the Second World War. However, we were conscious of troops moving from place to place in convoys of trucks. There was a high level of traffic between the military ‘Cantonment’ in Poona, further west of Lonavla and beyond the Ghats on the Deccan Plain. We would pass these convoys on the winding Ghat roads as we walked two-by two in crocodile fashion on our weekend walks. When the trucks rumbled by we girls stood aside and waved and cheered excitedly to the truck loads of British army troops (called ‘Tommies’). No doubt they were surprised to come upon a small band of children and a teacher cheering and waving excitedly. I can still see in my mind’s eye the cheers of delight and enthusiasm as they waved back to us.

Meals were served in the ‘refectory’ where there were long wooden tables and benches. Talking was not encouraged. The preschool group had earlier schedules for eating and sleeping so I didn’t get to see my sisters at meal times. Meals were simple: mostly vegetables from the garden with meat and fish being a luxury. There were many mandatory tasks at The Home which I expect were as much to save money as being considered good for our collective souls.

Amongst the range of punishments for misdemeanours one in particular seems to have lacked insight: children who wet their beds at night had to stand for some time at the bottom of their bed in the morning with their smelly wet sheet over their head. I was thankful that I did not wet my bed. I expect this humiliation did nothing to cure ‘culprits’ of the habit or dispel the psychological reason wherein lay its cause.

At about three years of age I got into terrible trouble during a game which involved holding hands in a circle because I refused to hold hands with a girl called Carol. I had got into my head that the black colour of Carol’s skin would rub off onto my hands, (like the charcoal from the hot water boiler) and make them dirty. The more I was shouted at the more I cried and howled and continued to refuse to hold hands. I was eventually removed from the game. I’m glad to report I did learn that my logic was flawed and that problem faded away. Carol and I, being the youngest at The Home, became best of friends.

In 1945 The Home was closed down. My sisters and I, along with the other girls there, were relocated to St. Peter’s Girls’ School in Khandala, an adjoining small town in the Ghats. I was aged eight at the time. In Lonavla my sisters, along with the other older orphans, had attended the local Railway School ¹ as day scholars. Now we were all boarders. Life takes twists and turns. Often a change or event has a significant impact on one’s life. Being sent to St Peter’s School proved to be one such stepping stone.

CHAPTER 2

St Peter’s School, Khandala

It was not just the children of the beggars on the streets that didn’t go to school. When I was young, universal free education in India did not exist and thousands of children across the land did not have access to education. There were moderately priced parochial primary schools and, where railway schools existed, they accepted local children. Even these schools were financially out of reach of many families. In contrast, there was a network of elite boarding schools mostly run along the lines of the British Public School ² system.

St Peter’s was one such school. It was hidden deep inside expansive grounds with manicured gardens and lush tropical trees that flowered profusely throughout their seasons. It was accessible only by a private driveway, the entrance well hidden from public view. Carved from the side of a hillside its layout reflected the hilly terrain. The playing fields were at the lowest level tucked away behind Casuarina trees. The chapel was higher up the slope, the senior dormitories still higher and the junior and kindergarten sections were higher still. A large stone staircase full of moss and greenery ran along the outside of the buildings and a covered way linked the buildings from top to bottom providing shelter during the monsoons.³

St. Peter’s School was a very prestigious girls’ school. Like many British schools in India it was initially established for the children of expatriates such as: British public servants, military servicemen, bankers and financial entrepreneurs (such as those working for The East India Company); importers / exporters; manufacturing executives and; the children of missionaries. Over time, these schools admitted children of the wealthy locals who were able and willing to pay the high fees for the privilege of a very British education. In such a class and status conscious society it made it even more remarkable that we orphans were placed there. The nuns who ran St. Peter’s were Anglican: Church of England (CofE), of the order called The Community of Saint Mary the Virgin (CSMV). Their home convent was in Wantage, Oxfordshire. Generally known as Sisters, these nuns were an ‘outgoing order’ rather than a ‘closed’ contemplative one.⁴ and were also involved in other local charitable activities.

The nuns wore a conventional long, white flowing habit (always immaculately clean) and a black veil that was placed over a white head piece which came low over their forehead hiding every strand of their hair. The veil extended down to their waist but often flowed behind them as they briskly went about their duties or in a high monsoonal wind. They had a decidedly penguin appearance which earned them the irreverent title (out of earshot) of ‘pengies". A large cross dangled like a beacon of their faith down their front. On their feet, they wore simple leather sandals.

I was not aware as to the reasons for me being at St. Peter’s instead of the orphanage, who was paying or even that the school was prestigious. I was just there - at another institution, which I took in my stride as children do…life IS! The kindergarten section became my new home. Angela and Lillian were placed in the middle school dormitory and Jane in the senior dormitory. At St. Peter’s our lives continued to be separated by dormitories and schedules. I only saw my sisters in the school chapel.

Although it was yet another institution the kindergarten was calm and nurturing. The memories I have from that time even though I was five years old are quite strong, if somewhat episodic.

The teachers were mostly, but not exclusively, Anglo Indians ⁵. The ayahs were young Indian girls employed in the dormitories to help the matrons. Ayah (I-yer) is a Hindi word meaning aunty but generally referred to the female domestic staff, maids or nannies. Married women were called by their first name followed by ‘Bai’(By). Mary Bai was one such person I remember well.

The matron, Miss Powel, who was probably English, played a dominant role in my first year there. She and the ayahs were very kind and happy people. I can remember them singing to us at bath time and giving us a big hug after towelling us dry. I subsequently learned that Miss Powel was English and at the time was training to be a nun. She was a very large lady. I can recall that some of us girls got in a huddle to work out why she stuck out so much in the front and why this part of her body bounced around as she walked - we didn’t know the word to describe this part of the anatomy. With our collective knowledge, we concluded she must have rags stuffed down there but we couldn’t fathom out why she would want to do that.

The ayahs had the long black hair that Indian women traditionally have, usually way past their waist and tied into one plait. I learned to plait hair with the guidance of an ayah or two - it was very satisfying to plait such long, thick black hair. I expect the friendship and enjoyment that developed from such grooming was mutual. For those of us at the school from the orphanage Miss Powel and these ayahs became our best friends.

The School Watchman was a Pathan. This cultural group from North West India, like their blood brothers in bordering Afghanistan, are tall and well built. They wear large bushy beards, have piercing, intense, fiery, dark eyes. They have a reputation for bravery, loyalty and fearlessness. Pathans were valued by the British Army and were usually hired as watchmen, a job where their attributes were also prized. We kindergarten children were terrified of the watchman. If he appeared in the playground we would set up a round of shrill screams and run away from him. To us he was a scary giant. He must have loved children and no doubt thought about our behaviour because he eventually won us over. He did this by inviting two of the bravest amongst us (I can’t remember if I was one of these!) to hold on to each of his taught forearms which he bent from the elbow like a thick branch. He then spun himself around and the two girls with him – like a human merry-go-round. No sooner had he lowered them to the floor when the rest of the group scrambled for a turn. From then on, he heard squeals of delight and had us laughing and begging for more turns at his game.

There are only three seasons in that part of India: hot and dry (March – July), hot and wet – the monsoons (August – October) and cool and dry (November - February). During the monsoons, it could rain for two weeks without a break. Overnight rivers, waterfalls and rock pools appeared in the hilly terrain around the school. In the hot dry season, some of these deeper pools would remain. As a special treat, Miss Powel would take us for a walk to a shallow pool and let us splash around like fledgling birds.

Miss Powel was also responsible for Girl Guide activities. In the extensive school grounds, slightly distant from the buildings, she organised campfire nights when we sang traditional English campfire songs and listened to her tell scary ghost stories. Like Girl Guide and Scout troupes around the world we were encouraged to accomplish a host of useful tasks. We strove to achieve acclamation - being rewarded with badges - as we demonstrated our abilities in a range of challenges. Some of the competencies were in such things as lighting a fire from the bush around us, boiling water on a campfire to make tea for the group, following a trail and tracking through the bush and tying a range of knots. The reef knot: left over right and right over left is one I have never forgotten! Table setting had us eagerly helping the ayahs place the cutlery, serviettes and mugs on our refectory table.

Sometimes we were allowed to run free in the hills near the school, probably under discreet supervision. There are many snakes in India but we didn’t panic when one crossed our path because we had learned which ones were poisonous. As I recall (perhaps unreliably) the snakes with less pointy heads and the small green snakes in the grass and in the rivulets and puddles were not harmful - we would just step over them. Whereas, we knew to stay well away from long snakes dangling from trees. Now-a-days, besides the likes of the cobra, I don’t think I would be quite so confident in identifying harmless snakes.

During the mango season, we would dart around picking up ripened fruit at the base of trees and in season the Currawanda bushes provided a feast of berries. There was no concern with pesticides. As we wandered around on those walks we would often see glistening outcrops of transparent and milky white crystalline rock that were made up of sharp angular pieces. Many years later in a museum I saw these stones exhibited which had the Ghats as its location tag. After so many years, it was exciting to see those rare rocks again.

In the Ghats there were many short, sharp spectacular tropical storms. While they lasted, the massive rumbling of thunder and the flashes of sheet and fork lightening were scary for children, especially when accompanied with electricity outages, as was often the case. When severe thunder shook the foundations of the building and we were simultaneously plunged into pitch blackness it inevitably triggered shrill screams from many excited or frightened girls. In later years, I enjoyed the Greek myth in which the sound of rolling thunder is said to be the sound of the gods playing marbles. I still enjoy thunderstorms, especially behind the safety of expansive plate glass.

There were two girls, sisters, who left a lasting impression on me. At the time I was not aware of the fact that they had been part of a group of children who had been led on a trek from Burma across the Himalayas to India.⁶ There were also girls who had lost their fathers with the British forces on other fronts. I remember hearing from one or two of my classmates that their fathers had ‘shell shock’. At that time, it was beyond my imagination as to what this could be, especially when explained in seven-year-old speak. It jumped back into my consciousness many years later when seeing examples of it in war movies.

Other children told of their fathers having ague. I knew about this because some children at the school had bouts of this too. It is a condition that occurs with severe malaria and often occurs in a 24-hour cycle. Depending on the severity of the infection, a person can become very weak and bedridden, shake uncontrollably as though they are shivering with cold even though their body breaks out in a sweat. When this phase passes, the infected person is left limp and tired. They fall asleep from exhaustion. Ague usually happens in the evening but can occur more often if the person is severely infected with malaria. It was alarming to watch class mates go through a bout of ague. We would call out to the ayah on duty if one of the girls started to