Passage 9

Read the following passage and answer the following given below:

I was very shy in my childhood. My first day at new school, I was half paralyzed when in the presence of a crowd. The teacher asked me to do a very smile things: I was sent to the blackboard to write my name and address. I knew my name and address, knew how to write it; but standing at the blackboard with the eyes of so many girls and boys looking at my back made me freeze inside and I was unable to write a single letter.

"Write your name," the teacher called to me.

I lifted the white chalk to the blackboard and, as I was about to write, my mind went blank. I could not remember my name, not even the first letter.somebody laughed and I stiffened.

" Just forget us and write your name and address, "the teacher said.

An impulse to write flashed through me, but the staring eyes at my back made me immobile; my hand refused to move. The children began to laugh and I flushed hotly.

"Don't you know your name?' she asked.

"Richard," I whispered.

"Richard what?"

"spell it."

I did

"Now can you write?"

"Yes, Ma'am."

"Then write it."

I turned to the blackboard and lifted my hand to write.Then, I was blank and empty within. I tried frantically to collect my senses, but I could remember nothing. A sense of the girls and boys behind me filled me to the exclusion of everything.I realised how utterly I was falling and I grew weak and leaned my hot forehead against the cold blackboard.The room burst into a loud and prolonged laugh that made my muscles freeze.

"You may go to your seat," the teacher said.

I sat and cursed myself .Why did I always appear so dumb when I was called to perform something in a crowd ? I knew how to write as well any pupil in the classroom and no doubt I could read better than any of them,and I could talk frequently and expressively when I was sure of myself.Then why did strange faces make me freeze ? I sat with my ears and neck burning, hearing the pupils whisper about me, hating myself, hating them.