I remained in the same school for secondary, so there was none of that spectacle for me at that level, and by the time I went to a new school abroad, I felt too old for drama.

Anyway, I wasn’t alone as there was one other new boy at the school joiningon the same day. As such, we stuck together before we got to mix and minglewith our classmates, many of whom had known each other for years.

I know that as I write this, most schoolchildren are already ontheir December holidays, but I am also aware that a few forward-thinkingparents have already begun planning for the back-to-school season to beat the January rush.

School begins next month, and the first week of January will see the usualcrowd of stressed-out parents scrambling to buy new books and uniforms.I got to thinking about the first day of school after catching a snippet ofmy favourite breakfast show in Cape Town, where they were announcing thewinner of their First Day Fly-In competition.

The competition will enable one child to make an unforgettable entrance ontheir first day of school, arriving by helicopter. The radio station alsothrows in a first-day party for the child’s class, a clever way to get allthe kids to feel involved.

Arriving at school by helicopter for the first day can be seen as a rare,extravagant display of wealth, custom-made for viral social media posts andcreating a buzz about extreme wealth disparity. However, it would appearthat in the radio station’s case, it seems to be all about creatingmemories and spreading good cheer.

Listening to the clip, I couldn’t help thinking about the unintendedconsequences of such a grand entrance. I don’t know what schoolchildrenare like these days, but in my day, there would have been some who made ittheir mission in life to tease and embarrass the kid who arrived with suchfanfare.

Such behaviour would have been driven by jealousy or envy, but I remembersome children were just mean for the sake of it.

Reporting on the first such event organsied by the radio station nearly 20years ago, my old newspaper, The Cape Argus, reported that the kids who wonthat competition, a pair of twins, arrived for their first day in GradeOne “in true Hollywood style”.

“The six-year-olds arrived by helicopter, landing on a netball court as excited pupils, staff and parents broke into applause,” the story went.

“Instead of theusual first-day tears, the high-flying twins could not stop smiling, andwhen the school bell rang, both rushed to class.”

***

It has been a sad couple of weeks for my circle of friends and me inMalindi. Our friend Maggie Bashford made a sudden exit from this life aftershe suffered a massive heart attack.

Maggie was one of those rare people who were universally loved, not justbecause she was easygoing and fun but also because she gave of herselftirelessly to her friends and the community at large.

A UK citizen, she moved to Kenya just over a couple of decades ago, and oneof the first major compassionate interventions she made was taking legalguardianship of an 18-month-old child whose mother had sadly died.

Shetreated the child as her own and, even after the guardianship ended,continued to be involved in his life and see him through further education.She was also the driver of a programme by a women’s charity deliveringsanitary pads every month to the Malindi women’s prison.

Maggie also took on several other causes, looking after several elderly people in Malindi and ensuring they had medical and financial assistance.

I could say a lot more about this wonderful human and her cheerfulness,efficiency, wit, natural modesty about her good works and so on, but space doesnot allow. All I can say is she will be greatly missed, and we are poorerfor this loss.