I awake at seven and haul myself into the en-suite; it’s not so glamorous, and if I didn’t have such a decadent adornment to my room it would make scant difference as I share the three-bedroom house with nobody. I bow down to the low sink, which in turn leans out at an ingratiating angle from the wall and I reach below it to turn on the stop-cock; the tap on the basin is a useless and mocking accessory. As I brush my teeth, the toothpaste laden water swirls around the plug-hole and deposits itself upon my feet.
Minutes later I’m out of the front door and walking past grey, horned cattle that wallow luxuriously in muddy pools. I squint through bleary eyes at palm trees, rubbish heaps, abandoned building projects populated by vegetation and snakes, and make my way up to the main excuse for a road running through the quiet district in which I live. I mumble replies to the several ‘misters’ that I receive on the two minute walk and whistle to one of the ojek riders further down the road.
There are no becaks in Jambi; instead of the colourful motorbikes with sidecars that plough through Medan’s dusty streets, the Jambians have gone for a more basic approach: motorbikes without the sidecars. A rider pulls up next to me and hands me a tatty, strapless helmet which I deposit upon my head before slinging my leg over the bike and positioning myself behind him, quickly grasping the rail situated behind my arse; I don’t believe it’s particularly manly to throw my arms around the gentleman’s waist. I don’t need to tell him where I’m going; I’ve needed to tell few ojek riders where I live or work since the second or third day that I’ve been in Jambi; news travels fast in this small but heavily populated city of around half a million inhabitants.
As we pick up speed, the wind begins to lift the over-large helmet from my head and, absurdly, I have to release one hand from the rail and hold my safety headwear in place. Often I won’t be given a helmet and I’ll enjoy the wind rushing past my exposed tête as we whip in and out of the crazy traffic; then, as we approach the centre of the city, a helmet will appear from somewhere and be brandished over the shoulder of the rider and I will have to use both hands to quickly fasten it upon my head, hoping that there will be no sudden acceleration resulting in me finishing the process while sat on the ground. One is required by law to wear a helmet in Indonesia but the legislation is flaunted outrageously. Where motorcyclists, of which there is a staggering amount in this country, actually obey the rule you can find an amusing array of headgear worn instead of the standard safety helmet. One may witness builders’ helmets, plastic German army replicas (I had one myself) and an astonishing array of other such ‘protective’ wear.
On the three or four mile journey into town, we cruise past fruit stalls and food vendors of every persuasion plying their wares along the side (and often in the middle) of the road. The journey becomes an exhilarating blur of colourful but faded and rotting houses, shacks, rusted corrugated-iron, wooden shacks, litter strewn canals, mosques, churches, bright flower-filled gardens, playing children, prone bodies occupying the shade, and the relentless chorus of “hello mister”.
The thrill costs 20p and lasts for twenty minutes before I’m dropped safely and gratefully at the school. The office and reception staff of the school are all young and beautiful women whom I greet with genuine affection and revel in the undeserved attention they give me; I won’t miss Jambi but I will miss them. I recover my towel and trunks from a spare classroom where they have been drying and head over to the Novotel Hotel for a swim. I plunge into the sun dappled roof-top pool, disturbing the enormous hovering dragon-flies and reflect that Jambi does have its moments.
Do you know how many tenses there are in the English language? Nor me, but there’s more than you would think unless you have to study or teach them all. We have Present Tenses which tell people that we are doing something right now and ones which refer to habits, routines and general truths. There are tenses that talk about the past but are connected to the present and ones which talk about something that started in the past and is still happening right now. We use tenses to illustrate that we did something in the past but it’s over now, something happened in the past after that thing that happened or interrupted that thing that we were doing in the past before that other thing happened. Bear with me. We have future tenses to talk about plans which are unlikely to be changed, ones which have only just been made and combinations of all of the above and more. Many more. The Indonesians have none.
What about:
I drank few beers at the weekend
[I didn’t drink many beers at the weekend]
I drank a few beers at the weekend
[I drank some beers at the weekend]
I drank a few beers at the weekend
[I got rat-arsed all weekend] [English understatement meant to convey a much inflated meaning to the stated one. Nudge nudge wink wink]
It’s no wonder we’re a nation infamous for not saying what we mean; we don’t know what we mean. Stiff upper-lip? We just can’t work out how we’re supposed to say what we mean to say. And now, through accidents of geography, politics and warfare, the rest of the world have got it into their heads that they need to learn this decidedly slippery and contrary language of ours; apart from the French, who are still pretending that they don’t understand a word. Which is great for me and the rest of the degenerate alcoholics, strays, fugitives and misfits who happen to have been born in an English speaking country and wish to inflict their accents, colloquisms, tics, stutters, and foul language upon an unsuspecting world other than France.
If you skipped even more quickly than usual over the first paragraph or so then it’s entirely understandable. I actually find grammar fascinating. I enjoy the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Conditional. Explaining that the Present Continuous tense can be used as a Future Tense given the addition of a time reference actually excites me. Give me any class from beginners to advanced, from teenagers to grandmothers and and I will happily expound the virtues of a dangling participle or a copular verb. But it’s the kids that are spoiling it for me. I would much rather spend half an hour explaining why it’s important to distinguish in pronunciation between ‘her’ and ‘whore’ or ‘shit’ and ‘sit’ with a class full of adolescent teenage boys than ever have to sing ‘Three Blind Mice’ with six year olds.
Most TEFL teachers have little experience with young children and it’s obvious why. It’s not hard to figure out that somebody who is being paid a paltry sum of money in some distant, faraway land has very few commitments, and if they do then they are obviously trying to escape from them. From this we can conclude that they do not have children, and if they do then they are patently distancing themselves from them, either voluntarily or because of restraining orders. Why on earth would you allow one of these infantophobes anywhere near your young child? I guarantee that you will be hard pressed to find a teacher that actually likes chanting the alphabet song repeatedly to five year olds unless they are professing their devotion to those irrational little runts in a job interview.
Adults want to be in the classroom because they either have an optimistic notion that speaking English will improve their chances of earning good money in the tin-pot dictatorship/banana republic in which they reside. Or their company is paying, in which case they have to pass the course or end up forking out for it themselves. Teenagers are there because their rich parents have deemed it necessary that they learn the international language of business for their bright futures and, although they don’t want to be there, you can at least manipulate, threaten, bully and intimidate a teenager into learning; or as a last resort make the lesson interesting. Kids cry. Kids can barely speak their own language. Kids need those frightening kindergarten teachers who speak in sing-song voices and love children because they have neither grown up or got the faintest hope of ever producing any themselves; the ones who revel in sticking hand-print outlines of the entire class on the wall in multi-coloured crayon.
So I’ve delegated. I’ve abused my laughable position of Senior Teacher and ‘acting’ Director of Studies (‘acting’ being the appropriate word) to hijack the timetable and reschedule it so that I no longer have to teach anybody under the age of twelve. The rest of the teaching staff now hate me but it’s worth it. Oh so worth it.
‘Simon Says’ anyone?
There is a knock at my office door and I quickly switch from playing Championship Manager to studying an Important –Looking-Document. It’s one of the Indonesian teachers looking extremely agitated and upset. I like Citra, she’s intelligent and confident with a good sense of humour and I wonder what can have upset such a usually placid woman. She sits down and tells me that she’s having a really bad day; her boyfriend has finished with her because his family don’t want them to be together and they have paid for a witch who has put a spell on her. Tricky.
Apparently, a Tunggu (witch) had physically forced Citra to drink some ‘tea’ despite her protests; and she believes the spell has cursed her; now her mind has gone crazy and she can’t possibly teach today. This is serious, if Citra can’t teach then I’ll have to cover her classes. And they’re all kids.
“I know you think I’m stupid for believing such things are real, but...” she wiped a tear away.
“Oh I do, I do believe. I believe in all that kind of stuff,” I tell her and she looks up, surprised.
“You do?”
“Oh yes, I’ve read a lot about it. Now the thing about curses,” I begin, warming to my new role of Master of the Dark Arts, “the thing about them is that they only work if you believe in them. If you choose not to believe them, then they have no power.”
“Really?” She asks, looking brighter already.
“Absolutely. In fact the way to stop dwelling on them is to carry on as usual, as if nothing had happened; the curse will then become meaningless.”
She stops crying and we chat about relationships, how it’s easier to just be single and the difficulties of Indonesian relationships with their respective families, until she is smiling again. I then suggest, as I guide her out of the door, that maybe she should just give the kids some tests or have them watch “Mr Bean” in the TV room, to which she responds positively. I sit back down and minimise my Important-Looking-Document window and think about buying Steven Gerrard.
I see her later and ask how she is. She waves a hand dismissively as she ushers some students into a classroom and tells me that she doesn’t believe in that cursing nonsense anymore.
Gonna take a goddamn High Priestess of Satan himself bewitching my teachers before I have to teach a class of kids any time soon.
