Back in LKG (Lower Kindergarten), I already had an answer to the grown-up question.
I wanted to be a painter. An artist.
I loved drawing and painting. I could sit alone in a room for hours, just drawing anything I wanted. No internet, no phone, just me, a copy, some colors, and a loud imagination.
One day my appa and mom asked me, “What do you want to be when you grow up?”
I said, “ma paxi painter bhanxu mummy, appa.”
That was the first version of me.
As I grew up, other people’s versions of me started to appear.
Relatives. Neighbours. Society. Everyone had a suggestion: doctor, engineer, military, something “respectable” and “secure”. Art was nice as a hobby, not as a future.
On my appa (dad) side, many were in the army, so that path was always there in the background too.
To be honest, I tried a lot of things. I had many hobbies later on. Somewhere between expectations and experiments, that loud “I will be a painter” voice started getting quieter.
My first and the last art teacher was Bhim Adhikari. I still remember him clearly. I met him a few months ago and he recognized me.
He was a seasonal, weekly teacher. We used to request for his class during the periods where other teachers asked hard questions, punished us and we were all scared.
Back then it was a different game. We were scared of teachers. When Bhim Sir came on Mondays or in the last period, the whole class felt lighter.
His class wasn’t just about painting. It was about learning how to be creative, how to express yourself, how to be free, how to be different, how to be unique.
He shared his life experiences, his struggles, his failures. I am grateful I was his student. I am grateful I had a teacher like him. I am grateful I got a chance to learn from him.
Once, I even got a packet of biscuits as a prize for my painting.
Fun fact: he often taught us landscape and nature, and I often drew cartoon or anime characters instead.
We used to buy stickers (we’d say ek patta for Rs. 5) and stick them in our copy. We tried to redraw them.
Then there was a moment that quietly changed everything.
In grade 8, there was a painting competition. I was so sure I would get a prize. I had that expectation and that small, desperate hope.
I didn’t win anything.
It sounds small now, but at that time, it hurt. I didn’t eat properly when I came back home. That expectation not being met made me slowly step back from painting. I was already training myself in other directions, influenced by ideas of the military, and I was doing well academically too.
Now, years later, I’m in tech, writing code instead of sketching mountains and cartoons. But whenever I sit alone with my laptop for hours, lost in fixing a bug or building something new, it reminds me of that same kid on the floor with colors and copies. These memories still visit me like old shades I haven’t used in a while, quietly reminding me that even if the canvas changed, the artist inside me never really left.
If you want to read how that tech journey unfolded, here’s my story:
Written by
Aju Tamang
Technologist & Product Tinkerer