AlphaMax Academy has Tagore bust garlanding ceremony

In a simple but elegant short ceremony distinguished guests including Indian Ambassador to Suriname Mrs. M Subashini garlanded the bust of Rabindranath Tagore in the courtyard of AlphaMax Academy in Paramaribo, Suriname on Tagore’s birth anniversary –the 7th May.

Rabindranath Tagore is India’s best-known writer and artist. He is the first non-European winner of the Nobel Prize and is the only known person to have written the national anthems for two different countries.

Rabindranath Tagore has had a profound influence on India’s philosophy and educational thought. He founded the influential Visva-Bharati University.
In the early twentieth century when travel was not easy he visited many countries lecturing on his ideas for a national education based on the lives of the people living in that nation. In his book The Discovery of India, Jawaharlal Nehru wrote, "He (Tagore) has been India's internationalist par excellence, believing and working for international co-operation, taking India's message to other countries and bringing their message to his own people."

India has commemorated his spreading of India’s ideas to many countries by assisting in the setting up of statues and busts in more than 20 countries.
Suriname was honored to be one of a dozen countries that received busts of Tagore on the 150th anniversary of his birth in 2011. AlphaMax Academy was selected as the place in Suriname where the bust was placed because of the Academy’s commitment to Tagore’s ideals. Several time a month Tagore’s poem “ Where the Head is Held High” from his Nobel Prize collection “ Gitanjali” is recited by the school’s community at their morning assembly.

The ceremony began with the singing of the national anthems of Suriname and India. Devesh Chaturdevi Indian Cultural Center musician then sang an enchanting Tagore song in Bengali. The audience warmly applauded his sincere rendition.

The Indian Ambassador, the head of the Indian Cultural Center, the first secreatary of the Indian Embassy , ICC staff and other senior members of the AlphaMax Community then garlanded the bust. The AlphaMax staff and students then recited Tagore’s “ Where the Head is Held High.”

Mr. Sean Taylor made a short speech in which he said that Tagore not only belonged to India but to countries like Suriname which cherished his ideals.
This part of the ceremony ended with brief remarks by the Indian Ambassador who expressed her deep appreciation of AlphaMax Academy’s commitment to Tagore’s ideals.

The audience then went to the school’s major auditorium for a short presentation. This consisted of a harvest dance “ Pous Utsav” by seven female AlphaMax students. Mrs. Kawita Thani of AlphaMax and Carinlangs choreographed this dance item.

Three members of the school’s drama group—members of the class of 2014 Reann Kersenhout (also member of the 2014 GAC class), Randy Esajas and Senior student Daniel Kolf did dramatic renditions of three poems from Gitanjali.

The audience applauded both the dance and the readings. The dance created a happy successful mood and the intense charged presentations of the poems stirred the audience with the emotional power of Tagore’s work

Tagore Ideals on Education

The curriculum at AlphaMax Academy is strongly influenced by the ideals of India's celebrated poet and artist Rabindranath Tagore.

Tagore Bust in the courtyard at AlphaMax Academy

From its inception in September 1998, teachers and students of the Academy have recited, often daily, those memorable words which first appeared in Tagore’s world-famous and respected collection of poetry, "Gitanjali."

            

"Where the mind is without fear and head is held high           

 Where knowledge is free             

 Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls         

 Where words come out from the depth of truth              

 Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection               

 Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary dead sand of dead habit              

 Where the mind is led forward by Thee into ever-widening thought and action      

 Into that heaven of free, my dear beloved God, let us all awake”.

First Lady of Suriname speaking at the  unveiling of Tagore monument

On June 4th 2011 Suriname’s First Lady Ingrid Bouterse Waldring unveiled the Tagore monument, a sculpted bronze figure of Tagore, which has a plaque that bears this inspiring prayer.This monument, a gift from India to Suriname, is one of several worldwide. AlphaMax Academy is proud to be the custodian of Tagore's bust for the people of Suriname.

In 1918, Tagore founded Visva Bharati University – an international center of Culture and Humanistic Studies.

Tagore considered the lack of education to be the main obstacle in the way of national progress and at the root of all its problems. He thought that the basic objectives of any worthwhile national education system were to promote, creativity, freedom, joy, and an awareness of a country’s cultural heritage.

Therefore he worked assiduously towards developing an appropriate system of national education. He felt that each nation was different and this fact should be reflected in its system of education.

Some of his salient thoughts on this topic were:
“In every nation, education [should be] intimately associated with the life of the people.”

“Let the students gather knowledge and materials from different regions of the country, from direct sources and from their own independent efforts.”

“We must try to understand how [our native] genius express[es] itself… Unless we try to put these together and discover the integrating factors behind these diverse streams of thought and make them a subject of study at our universities, we would only be borrowing knowledge from abroad. The natural habitat for knowledge is where it is produced. The main task of universities is to produce knowledge, its dissemination is its secondary function. We must invite those intellectuals and scholars to our universities who are engaged in research, invention or creative activity.”

To help foster and enrich the holistic formation of its young scholars, from its inception, the Academy has devoted four of its five school days to left-brain academic and ratiocinative development and activities, and one full school day to right-brain creative endeavors.

An unswerving resilient insistence on the latter is vintage Tagore, who like his Occidental contemporaries, Rudolf Steiner and Maria Montessori deplored lop or one-sided child/human development at the expense of a willful fostering and guidance of creative gifts and skills.  Indeed it is through the latter that the inner ‘child’ is nurtured and brought to a ripe maturity.

To illustrate how important contact with nature was to the life of the educator and poet, during one of his many travels to lecture in the West, Tagore wrote:

“I wish I could be released from this mission.  For such missions are like a  mist that envelops our souls – they seem to shut us off from the direct touch of God’s world…  The springtime has come – the sky is over-flowing  with sunshine.  I long to be one with the birds, and trees and the green  earth.  The call comes to me from the air to sing, but, wretched creature  that I am, I lecture – and by doing it I ostracize myself from this great world of songs to which I was born.”

New York, March 18th, 1921.

On Mat 7th 2014 there will be a garlanding of Tagore's Bust at AlphaMax Academy.

Tagore Bust Unveiled at AlphaMax Academy in Suriname

Thursday, June 2^nd, 2011

On Saturday morning, 4^th June, Her Excellency First Lady Ingrid Bouterse-Waldring joined His Excellency K.J.S. Sodhi, Ambassador of India at the official unveiling ceremony of the national bust of Rabindranath Tagore on the lawns of AlphaMax Academy. Over 150 persons, including local dignitaries, such as Vice President of the Republic of Suriname, H.E. Robert Ameerali and H.E. Mrs. Ameerali, ICC Director to Suriname, and scores of AlphaMax Academy teachers, school children, and parents were on hand to witness the historic moment at the Academy’s facility located on Stanvastestraat and Stierappelstraat in Zorg-en-hoop, Paramaribo.

The majestic bronze bust, which weighed 250 kilograms, was a gift from the Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR), in New Delhi, to mark the 150th Birth Anniversary Year of India’s most internationally celebrated poet of the 20^th century. In 1913, Tagore, who was also renowned as an educator, philosopher, dramatist, choreographer, singer, songwriter, orator and publisher, was the first Asian and the first non-European to win a Nobel Prize. Born on May 7^th, 1841, Tagore – who, following his Nobel Prize laureate conducted lecture tours in Asia, Europe and the Americas – is a cross-cultural international icon, enjoying profound respect in East and West as a supreme artist, scholar, and international humanist.

First Lady Ingrid Bouterse and Ambassador Sodhi addressed the gathering following the unveiling ceremony. The First Lady said, “While reading his biography I learned that Tagore worked hard to develop an appropriate system of national education. In 1918 he founded the Visva Bharati University, an international center of Culture and Humanistic Studies, because in his opinion the lack of education was the main obstacle for national progress. Indeed, knowledge is a fundamental need for development and growth of a nation.

“One of Tagore’s ‘fireflies’ teaches us that in every nation,” the First Lady continued, “education should be intimately associated with the life of the people. Children and Education is therefore my most important working area. In my opinion all children should have access to education. And of course culture, art, music and literature are very important in the development of our children. They bring color to our lives, inspire us to enjoy nature, and teach us to appreciate the little things that life brings to us.”

The Tagore bust on the lawn of the AlphaMax is one of 14 replicas to be unveiled worldwide, all presents of the Government & People of India through the Embassy of India and the Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR). The 1.20 meter bronze metal bust is a masterpiece exemplar of the work of India’s renowned sculptor, Gautam Pal, who also hails from Bengal, the home-state of Tagore. To date, Tagore busts have been unveiled by national leaders in Seoul, South Korea, Dhaka, Bangladesh, Havana, Cuba, Shanghai, China, and Singapore.

The ceremony was counterpointed by several cultural presentations which featured the work of Rabindranath Tagore. ICCR’s vocal music teacher in Suriname, Mrs. Mahhumita Bose – also a Bengali by birth – sang a deeply moving Rabindranath Sangeet, “Aloker-ei jharna dharai dhuije dao.” Students from the Academy gave two oral interpretative renditions of five Tagore poems. In order of presentation, first were selections from Tagore’s world famous ‘Gitanjali,’ followed by a Tagorean porm, ‘Earth,’ which the poet published in 1893. The AlphaMax presentations were made by Shafeek Nazir (Class of 2011), Ruth Saman (Class of 2011), Kristina Taylor (Junior), Reann Kersenhout (Sophomore), and Mr. Taylor, the Academy’s Principal & Director.

The cultural celebration of the morning came to a climax with the enthralling presentation of the “Bihu Dance” performed by visiting Indian artistes and dancers from the state of Assam in India. With hand and body gestures that were reminiscent of dance steps of indigenous peoples of Suriname, the Assam dancers received a standing ovation after their performance. It was the group’s first public appearance in Paramaribo following successful presentations in the Eastern Caribbean.

The Tagore bust-unveiling ceremony is part of a series of celebratory events organized by the Rabindranath Tagore 150^th Birth Anniversary Celebration Committee. The latter consists of the Embassy of India, the Indian Cultural Center, the AlphaMax Academy, ArtVibes United, and Schrijversgroep ’77. Last month, Art Vibes United in collaboration with the co-sponsors presented a week-long art and sculpture exhibition at Fort Zeelandia. This month, the Schrijversgroep and Art Vibes United are co-sponsoring art and creative writing competitions for school children at the VOJ and VOS levels. Entries for these national school competitions will close by June 30^th, 2011.

For information, please visit www.iccsuriname.com , www.indembassysuriname.com or www.schrijversgroep77.org

Starting Monday, June 7^th, entries will be open for an adult National Art Competition and an adult National Creative Writing and Poetry competitions. Rules for the art, poetry, and writing competitions are available online at www.iccsuriname.com , www.indembassysuriname.com and www.schrijversgroep77.org. Entries will close on July 31^st, 2011.

The winners from the national schools and adult competitions will be announced by August 7^th, 2011. Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore left these mortal shores on August 7^th, 1941.