Nithya H R discovers the Good Shepherd Finishing School , the nearest equivalent to a Swiss Finishing School

Natasha fits a typical profile — she has well-to-do parents who have an Indo-Western approach to life, a Gujarati medium education (and therefore passed out without a convent education and is now looking to become savvy and socially mobile) and plans to marry a new generation NRI software whiz-kid, travel the world and be a woman of tomorrow... today!

She's getting the help she needs along the way from the all-new Good Shepherd Finishing School at Ootacamund. The name is already one to reckon with, because of the school's established credibility and public school lineage that has been nurtured over the years by its principal, Dr P C Thomas.

Why Go To A Finishing School?
You could argue that the social skills for the lady of tomorrow in India have traditionally been taught by a mother, a grandmother and when things are conducive, even a mother-in-law. Well, time for a quick change in thinking. Explains Tulsi Bhatia, the Dean-in-waiting at this finishing school, “It all boils down to the increasing emergence of nuclear families and the eroding of the old joint family system. The traditional channels for acquiring social graces and quality are almost non-existent today. And in double income households, where the mother is busy pursuing a career, kids tend to grow up without attention to these type of things, let alone formal grooming for a socially significant lifestyle.”

What They Learn
Starting with lessons in community living, coexistence, tolerance and value education, the students are put through a 10-month term, which inculcates in them the various skills that might be useful for women around the home and the workplace.

Table etiquette, dietetics and nutritional advice, Ikebana arrangements, home furnishing design, beauty therapy, fashion designing are all on the curriculum, as well as more hardy ‘boy-type’ activities, like being familiar with domestic electrical circuitry, fixing leaky kitchen taps, and if you are mechanically inclined, even adding a growl to your car.

There are also lessons in confidence building, homemaking, and parenting with an emphasis on physical fitness, maintained through a demanding regimen of activities that include aerobics, swimming, workouts, horse riding, a little bit of rock climbing and yoga for the mind. All this learning eventually garners the candidate a diploma that certifies that she can hold her own in society.

All hail then, the Indian finishing school — the new elevator to the top of the social pinnacle for the wannabe young woman.