“I know you’re an honorable man…”. That phrase is going to influence my life for some time to come.
In light of being that honorable man, you know, the one that I am, I faced the demons of my second task. Yesterday, I tried to get the attention of the Money Man’s Right Hand early in the morning. She was flustered about something; looks like the teachers were crapped out again about the poor performance of the students in pre-lim tests running up to the big, fat, final exams looming just a week or so away.
After she took the punishment from the HoD, they came looking for me, but then the Money Man was off on some or other errand. “What’s wrong?”, she enquired. I didn’t feel like telling her and let her break the news to him without me. “It’s ok, we can talk later”, I said ending the conversation.
A little after lunch she fetched me from the office. “He’s there now”, she said and walked to his office together. He was reading the newspaper. He’s a busy man. “Sit down”, he said in Chinese, patting next to him on the wooden bench he was sitting on to invite me over. Oh, how fatherly, I thought to myself and wondered if he was suspecting what was coming.
I sat down and looked at him while I said it in English, even though he doesn’t understand. “I have some family issues, and I can’t stay”, is how I bluntly put it. I’m South African. It has often been said South Africans get straight to the point. He watched his eyes as The Right Hand translated. He didn’t even flinch. I was a bit disappointed.
I continued to explain the issues around seeing my son and wanting to be there for him growing up, but the restriction with travelling and his mother, etc. The Right Hand has a boy exactly the same age as my son, so I know I had a little of her empathy. Her eyes were a bit watery. Not sure if she was sad for me going or if the heat of the day was getting unbearable. Maybe it was the stress of now having to try and find another teacher.
They didn’t argue, they didn’t protest. They did ask if there wasn’t any way I could stay though, but I said I have been thinking about it for some time, and this really is the only way. They complemented on how my teaching has improved over the year and I thought that from nothing, it is easy to improve to something. Then they asked if I had any suggestions. I have tons, but it’s not my place to deconstruct their entire way of working.
So, I commented on how I would like to see them take English out of the classrooms and introduce it everywhere – where the kids eat, sleep and play. I also said that if I stayed, I would have liked to have a dedicated English class, so that the kids had to come to me, and not like it is now, me to them. It would be a little more interesting for them, and get them excited when they had to come there. Also, it would be possible to make the room into something nice, with English and stuff on the walls, and a storage place for all the props for lessons.
They nodded. The way you nod at a suggestion somebody made, not because you will follow it, but because you want to be polite in their presence.
“Is there anything we can do to help?” the Right Hand finally asked, having translated what the Money Man had said. “Nah”, I said thinking a bit, “I only really need two things. The one is to get all my money paid, including for the return flight.” She translated. “Yeah, no problem”, said the Money Man very enthusiastically, as if there has never been any issue with paying money due to me.
“The other thing”, I continued, “is that I need to leave a few days earlier. My contract ends 30 June, but I need to maybe leave around 27 June”. Again, she translated, and again the Money Man nodded with enthusiasm. “That’s it”, I said finishing off the conversation and aiming to leave.
As I stood up to leave the office, they asked if I had any contacts for people who might want to come work there. Ha, I thought, if I had, would I really recommend them to this school? “Not really”, I said, “but I will email some friends and see what I can find.” I lied. “But I can’t promise anything.”
“Sure”, said the Money Man. “But try anyway”, added the Right Hand. Getting teachers for this school is not that easy. I think, and King agrees, they will struggle to find a replacement.
And that is how I managed to tick off task number two on my devilish list. Now remains only the most horrendous task of all. Facing the Banshee.