| View Blog
|
| Wrath of Nancy Part Three: Return of the Jew
|
|
|
|
A long time ago in a country far, far away....
POPPING CHINAS
CHERRY
The last two days have been fantastic; Nancy has basically stayed out of my way thanks in part to my logic and sensible arguments. In one fell swoopI had shut down her tyrannical ways. She still doesn't smile at me, the relationship I would want with her is at best cordial so I really wouldn't want her to anyway. I used to find her attractive when I first met her but as the days turned into weeks she progressively lost whatever appeal she had going for her, it was consumed by the ugliness of the real person inside. Now all I can see when I look at her is a small shriveled shell of a person hiding the unsightly and nasty disposition towards her fellow man.
This is the last day I will have to deal with her by myself for any length of time though. Chris will get back later on today and then we can do what we usually do with Chinese people like her or any other "Welcome to China" situations. We will present a united front of western values and ideas that with the two of us standing behind them can't be stopped due to our white skin and the oriental predisposition towards fearing westerners. It also helps our arguments to have me with my stoic unyeilding stance against the administrations awful teaching strategies and Chris doing what he usually does, flying off the handle and yelling until they agree. In just a few more hours I can go back to my regularly scheduled classes and half my contact with that angry spawn of disgust and corruption. I am still supposed to teach Chris's classes the whole ownership thing along with some songs because with him not here it is not like I can choose what the class gets taught. Regardless of what he asked before he left it is no longer up to me. No, Nancy made that decision for the both of us and so I teach them useless English until Chris gets back then he can do whatever he wants with them
The first couple of classes went smoothly enough without any meddling from Nancy. It put me in a really good mood for the rest of the day. I shouldn't have expected my contentment to last though, in China you can pretty much expect to be shut down from any feelings of joy withing the first hour of two. In this school Nancy gladly handles that position and rains on everyones parade. She comes right up to me minutes before Chris's first class and tells me again that I am to teach them ownership and cover "this old man". I am already resigned to this fate and tell her that she is starting to sound like a broken record and go into the class ignoring whatever she said next. The class is calm, compared to the grade threes the ones and twos are a flawless examples of discipline and amity. Another great part about handling these classes is that there is pretty much no thinking involved, the younger kids need more repetition and less complexity in their lessons so a half hour lesson is no trouble at all.
She didn't follow me inside and walked down the hallway probably to return to her office. It was a smart move on her part, she had done enough the last few days to warrant a tar and feathering if the roles had been reversed and Chris had to deal with this he might have either quit or burned her office down. In any case I could get to teaching and so I turned the class and started pronouns. They caught on faster then I would have believed until I remembered Nancy chose this unit for its simplicity and the words themselves are easier to translate from English to Chinese. Even if I didn't agree with the reasons behind the lesson I still got pretty into it and by the end when teaching them "This Old Man" I was enjoying it immensely.
Finishing the class and returning upstairs to play some Call of Duty in the office I get a text message from Chris. He is back in Taixing and only about ten minutes from the school. Well that is just fantastic, so I get things rolling by texting him back with a short message about how Nancy forced me to teach his class a different unit then he was doing and I had had no choice but to follow along with what she wanted. I then went and stood outside hoping to hear the scream of outrage that should be impossible to hear over the steady drone of traffic, construction and random yelling in China. I of course didn't hear it and I didn't get a text back from Chris either so I am pretty sure he is angry. The game forgotten I make my way towards the foreign affairs office to stake myself out a good spot to watch the spectacle that is about to happen. Across the courtyard from the office are some bushes and a concrete bench so I made myself ready for a little entertainment. I sat down just as Chris walked through the gate.
The look of anger on his face was unmistakable even at this distance. I don't even think he noticed me sitting there watching as he made a beeline straight for the office. He rips the door open and storms inside leaving the swinging door hanging in his wake. It is good that he left it open, now I can listen to his rant as well as watch the developing argument through the window. The door bounces off the frame again rebounding back to it's stationary place resting on the door and the yelling starts. Chris opens with a question yelling something to the effect of why are you meddling in my classes? Even from here and through the window I could see the shock still on Nancy's face from the door being slammed and the new look of fear from the enraged Canadian ambushing her. It takes a moment for the accusation to penetrate the language barrier and to sink in to her head. When she gets it finally she looks angry now too and gets up from her chair not giving any ground to Chris. So it begins.
I will say this for Nancy she didn't take it lying down. She yells back in English and Chinese that those were the lessons that Chris should have been teaching in the first place to go along with the textbook. So basically she is just rehashing what she used on me not having come up with anything new or creative to argue with in the last day. The deeply crimson face of my face was darkening with every word that came out of her mouth and she did not even finish before he stepped up the screaming match. I couldn't help myself a small snicker escaped my mouth enjoying this battle of wills. He is at it again yelling that she cannot control his classes and what he teaches needs to be learned by the children regardless of what she thinks.
A small step backwards was all it took and from Nancy's face a brief look of fear momentarily crossed her features which was all Chris needed, he pressed his advantage. I am struggling to hold it together and I start laughing to myself as quietly as possible. I know about twenty feet of space and a wall separates us but I didn't want to ruin this perfect moment by being caught laughing at it. Chris is in full rant mode now and as such it would even be difficult for someone who speaks English as a first language to understand. Spit is flying from his mouth with ever syllable and Nancy can no longer get a word in edge wise so he continues. I am only understanding about every second word now his throwing sounds related to those of a boiler under pressure. Indeed he would almost be better to emit a high pitched whistling from the obvious buildup of steam inside him.
That image proves to be my undoing and I am laughing harder now holding my sides when they start to hurt, I am not even paying attention to the fight anymore it is just too much. I fall off the bench on to the ground with tears streaming down my face as the distant fight still reaches my ears through the hilarity. I hear words like "again" and "quitting" which is enough to keep up my understanding of what is happening but I can't look anymore and lie there laughing harder with each breath until I hear the office door close and squint through my watering eyes to see Chris watching my pitiable condition.
"Oh You Jackass!" He yells and storms off leaving me to my fun.
By: Alex Murray |
|
Posted by PoppingChinasCherry on 2008-01-25 12:17:25 | Rating: | Views: 46
|
| |
|
|
