To be honest, I was actually a bit nervous when I entered the storytelling classroom. I had an idea that storytelling would be something like oral presentation or something where we have to come infront of the class and tell a story. The first thing we had to do was to think of 5 things that we’d bet our classmates dont know about us. I was kind of shocked when I saw what Mr. Ryan had written on the board. I was expecting something like “Why I chose FSV” or something like that. My mind was blank and I seriously didnt know what to write. Well, i didnt want my classmates to know everything about me so i had to think of something which wont be too perosnal. I thought for very long and finally came up with 5 things which were not very interesting. Let me share with you the the 5 things again.
1. I like to write.
2. I’m very bad at maths.
3. I love to eat spicy food.
4. I like to drink milkshake.
5. I like to shop.
Actually i was not very pleased with what I came up with because they were so mundane and boring but I had no choice because the time was up. The guessing game was fun because I knew certain things about my classmates which i totally didn’t know about. After that fun guessing game, we had to form a circle. I had a very bad feeling when Mr. Ryan asked us to form a cirlce. I dont know why but i never liked games which makes us stand around in a circle. I was prepared for the worst. We had to think of an adjective which sounds a bit like our name. That was not the bad part, we had to come up with a symbol or something and we have to repeat what everyone said before us before we could say our own.
Since I’m a really conscious person, I could not think of anything at all and the fact that I had to repeat my other classmates name didn’t make things easy for me. I was becoming more and more nervous as my turn came nearer and nearer. When my turn did come, i did something very stupid. I totally forgot that the adjective infront of my name had to rhyme with my name or atleast sound simillar. I said something so stupid like, “Cool Vani” which does not even a ryhme a bit. That was not it. I had thought of a thumbs up sign with “Cool Vani” but Wendy, the girl before me had just used that sign so I seriously didnt know what to do. By this time, everyone was waiting for me to come with something and my whole class staring at me didn’t make it easy for me to think of something on the spot. Finally I came up with ” Vain Vani”.
I was really relieved when we were told to go back to our seats. I found the first lesson to be very interesting as Mr. Ryan spoke about some really cool stuff. He said that there are stories all around us. I totally agree with that. Each and everyone of us has a story to tell. It doesnt matter if our story is interesting or funny. Its still a story. The world is filled with stories. Each individual in this world has a story of his own and no ones’ life story will be simillar to another person’s life story. We can never say that we dont have a story to write about because the world is filled with stories. Even our own life is a story.
As the lesson progresed, I was very impressed with the storytelling module. It was all about my favourite thing to do, to write stories. I was actually very sad after secondary school as thought i wont have the chance to write my narrative or descriptive stories anymore. Most of my older friends told me that in tertiarylevel, we could only write argumentative essays. I was very disappointed but after Mr. Ryan explained that storytelling is about writing stories. I was thrilled! Finally i could write my narrative stories again! I love to write stories! I feel you can escape to a totally new world, live a totally new life through stories and movies.
After that, Mr.Ryan told us to open up our laptops and said that all the assignments would be done in a blog for storytelling. I felt it was a very new approach. I have never had a blog before so it was something very new for me. It was something out of the norm.
Then came the really fun part. “Dominic puts on his hula girl outfit and enters the temple”.That was what Mr. Ryan wrote on the board! It was hilarious! We had to come up with a story with that as the opening sentence within twenty minutes. At first nothing came to my mind, only the vision of Dominic entering the temple with the hula girl outfit. Which was not a very pretty sight! Finally I came up with something within the twenty minutes. Its not very good but this is all I could think of within the twenty minutes:
Dominic puts on his hula girl outfit and enters the temple. The people at the temple begin to look at him weirdly. Dominic starts to dance in the middle of the temple infront of everyone. A huge crowd surrounds Dominic and people start to cheer for him. After dancing Dominic begins to skip around the temple searching for a place to rest. A priest comes near Dominic and warns to him to leave the temple but Dominic continues to skip around refusing to leave. The priest gives him an apple and walks away. Dominic finds a nice shaded area and begins to eat the apple. Dominic begins to feel dizzy and uncomfortable. He was starting to change into a real girl. Dominic begins to panic and he starts to scream. The priest smiles and leaves the temple with satisfaction.
The fact that the whole story had to be in present tense, made it more difficult! I am very used to writing stories in the past tense so it was a bit hard for me at first. This prevented me from totally focusing on the story as I was more concerned with my tenses.Some of us were chosen to share our stories with the rest of the class and most of them were really good. Dominic’s one was the funny one about the main character going to the temple to find a mate. Sonia’s story was something about a robbery which was also very intriguing. Wendy’s story about the little boy was also nice.
I felt the lesson was fun and enjoyable. The class had a nice relaxed atmosphere. I hope that all the storytelling classes in the future would be as fun and enjoyable like our very first one!
