Memories Of A Young Man As A Teacher (34)

In case you missed the previous episode. Read here

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I got two queries on my desk the day after the Christmas Party. The first one was aiding and abetting a demonic dance move. The second one was for holding jollof rice hostage (I still have this one on my desk as I write this and it never ceased to crack my ribs into many pieces).

Everyone was sympathetic to me for query number one because there was no how, they believed, I could tell how bad the dance would be executed/received – a dance whose idea I didn’t conceive, a dance which rehearsals I didn’t coach.

But for holding jollof rice hostage, everyone was asking for my head. Even Mrs. Anozie wasn’t by my side. I would grapple with this alone.

So I sat at my desk, weighing my options. I did what I did for my class, boys and girls I loved and cared for, all of whom paid the 1000 naira for the party, the only class with 100% payment. The least you could do was give them jollof rice whether or not they brought cooler or not.

I had the mind to just stand up and leave and never return.

I was a hero and heroes don’t quit. If I quit, what would be my excuse, that I left because of jollof rice? Not for the benefit of my belly, I can quickly add but what good would it do? Even Bismarck will not understand.

If I had headbutted MC Somebody who was actually a Nobody and broken his insipid nose, or if I had floored him on the dust pressing his potbelly on the sand and filling his lungs with dust, or if I had removed his leg and beat him on the head with his shinbone, then I leave afterward, it would be worth it. Bismarck would have been proud of me.

Something told me to take this battle to the kids and like Mark Anthony stir them to revolt. But I dismissed that immediately. I wouldn’t ask kids to fight for me. I wouldn’t bring bazookas to a knife fight.

An actor leaves the stage, they say, when the ovation is loudest. Not when the ovation is about jollof – who got and who didn’t, who brought cooler and who didn’t. I was the actor, better than the proverbial actor even. I was a legend. And a legend is not a food nutritionist.

I am a man of letters. I would never run at the sight of words. That would be my Literature degree in the mud. Moreso, I was no rebellious staffer. I would lose my right to demand obedience if I made nonsense of any form of authority. The kids may never know but I would know and it would diminish me.

I decided to answer the queries. For the girls dancing a “demonic dance” that “embarrassed” the school (although I can count and exhaust all the fingers in my hands and all the toes in my feet, parents and guests who were genuinely entertained and were sorry that it ended, shut down by an outraged proprietress who screamed her gullet out at the DJ), I took responsibility.

I am an artist, a poet, and a man of aesthetics. I was wrong in giving art a chance, I was wrong in allowing the musical expression of the next generation to manifest.

For the jollof query, I wrote the following:

Dear sir,

Some teachers are born great, some teachers attain greatness in the classroom, and some give a leg, an arm, and a tooth for greatness. Today, I am thrust with an unwinnable task. I have to dig the tooth, the arm, and the leg. This is not preposterous, this is not ludicrous, this is not horrid, but this is not an over joyous act: It is antithetical to the spirit of candor, of duty, of sacrifice.

Not the leader of the Jewish Exodus, not the Nazarene, not the beloved, not the apostle from Tarsus, not Cranmer, nor any of the beatified of Christendom, nor of Classical persuasion have been put on a lever where they have to expound with words an art that which was inscribed in blood while still dripping with crimson oil.

Not since the Wollof founded Jollof has one man been put on Abacha’s highway, chained in the manacles of Fela for standing up for kids in a messy world made so by adults. Authority belies consequence and there is justice for only those who seek and seek and seek, but not for those who dig and dig and dig. For an arm given is taken, a tooth buried is gone, and a leg forwent is only to be spoken in past verbs.

Nothing can be unburied, nothing can be ungiven, nothing can forth come that forwent. Martin Luther Jr shall not be shamed, not Lincoln, not Sartre, not Gandhi. But today, there is a noose for every one of them from Socrates to Saro Wiwa, for better for gore, nay, for gore, gorer – for the gored.

The chopping board gives a worthy fight. It is not a win-win combat.  

Accept my apologia.

Yours sincerely,

M.K.O, B.A (Hons), Litt., Eng., Thap, etc.

To be continued…

Memories Of A Young Man As A Teacher (33)

In case you missed the last episode.

*

The Christmas party was billed to start by 12pm but at a couple of minutes past 3, the ground was still rowdy and the high table wasn’t set. We were asked to invite our friends, I didn’t (actually, I did but Bismarck said he was neck deep with work), so if the teachers and owners of the Mount Sinai School wanted to disgrace themselves, the court was wide enough.

I just hope the jollof prove finishable.

I counted twenty-two parents, mostly women, and shook my head. The proprietress wanted to use this as a revenue raising avenue, I wasn’t holding my breath for her, for this.

I was seated at the VP’s office and since the curtain of the door was opened, I could see everything coming and going into the four canopies of the ground.

Chisom entered the office without knocking. “Uncle, how do I look?”

She was wearing a gown with gathers and her makeup was a little too much. “You are beautiful,” I said.

She frowned. I didn’t sound convincing. “Are you sure?”

“You guys should better start this party. I have other engagements.”

She eyed me, her eyes dancing with knowingness. “Aunty Computer or Aunty -?”

I reached for my shoe. She ran away mid-question.

My shoes were a little tight. I removed them and stretched my toes with relief. I was wearing long sleeves shirt over black trousers and looking every yard an underpaid teacher.

My class (JS3) captain said knock knock at the door.

“What do you want?”

“Aunty Chika said I should tell you to bring the cooler for our class rice.”

The Christmas party rice was shared class by class and each class had to provide their cooler. I thought I told someone in JS3 to bring cooler for my class, actually for their class, their food.

“So nobody donated cooler?”

He shook his head. I began to wear my slightly undersized shoes. “Let’s go there.”

They cooked at the proprietress’ house but they brought the food to a classroom they converted into the food war room. An unsmiling teacher sat guard over the food coolers. All of the coolers have been marked with the class or group that would devour it.

“What’s your class?” She asked me, ignoring my good afternoon.

“JS3.”

“There’s no cooler for JS3.”

“So no food for them?” I demanded.

“I don’t know,” she said, “we have packed food for every class with cooler.”

“So because of cooler, the only class with 100% Christmas party payment will go without food…?”

I was interrupted by “uncle” from a secondary school kid. “The head teacher is calling you to do MC?”

I sighed knowing that the fight for food would be done through third parties. “I will be back.” I stamped out of the food classroom.

The stage and the table had been set and there are at least 50 parents under the canopies. I approached the head teacher. “Where’s Uncle Matthew?”

“He went to get the comedian from Blaze FM.”

I shook my head and stepped to the centre, standing in a way that I faced the whole people. I realized I was breathing high from the quarrel at the food classroom.

“I am srraight from fighting for food,” I said.

Everyone laughed. I relaxed.

“Before some of you would wonder where the food is going in my body,” I said, “I wasn’t fighting for me.”

They laughed.

“I was fighting for my class. But if you see them, you will still wonder where the food goes to.”

More laughter.

“Ladies and gentemen, welcome to Mount Sinai Christmas Party 2015.”

They clapped.

“If you want to clap clap, if you don’t dont.”

They clapped and cheered.

“Before we proceed we need to invite the Most High.” I had spotted the wife of the PTA Chairman seated by her husband at the high table and legend (or rumour) had it that she usually cooked her own meal with fried chicken and beef pepper soup for her kids and their family and friends. I gave her the mic to say the opening prayer.

And remove your thoughts from the gutter. I didn’t do this for the rice and chicken and co. Just that in chess, you are advised to put your rook behind a passed pawn.

The woman said a short prayer then I invited the director for the opening remarks. And the party began.

The first presentation was the Ozubulu dance. It was intense the drumming (and the moves), it looked like the real thing, and it was beautiful. More than half of the parents, at a point, joined them on the dance floor and sprayed a naira note or two. There was a young father who sprayed a bundle of 200 naira notes.

The party was fired up. It caught actual fire when the comedian from Blaze FM arrived. I can’t remember his name so let’s call him MC Somebody. The students and parents hailed. He and Uncle Matthew joined the dance and the crowd thundered.

I lifted the mic to my mouth and said. “This is beautiful. This is memontious. This is powerful. A display of cultural excellence. A blend of the present and the future…”

MC Somebody did a stylish move with his arms and leg and the crowd thundered, drowning my voice.

It was at this point that I decided there is no need for a scandal. I looked up at the balcony where most of the senior students stood and beckoned.

Adaora came down to me. “Your dance is cancelled,” I said to her.

“Oh no, sir. You assuranced us.’

“I did and I won’t allow it again. I will strike it out of the programme.”

I began to move toward the dance floor as a dismissal to Adaora but the closer I got, the more it looked like I wanted to spray money or join them in the dance. Since I didn’t have money, it would have to be to dance with them. My heart began to race with the tension of the future disgrace as I couldn’t dance to save my salary and not this cultural dance…

The drumming stopped and the dance ended. The crowd cheered and I thought I heard a few boos at the dance ending just before my joining. I exhaled with joy.

“I can’t believe I have to remind you all to clap,” I said.

I stopped before the celebrity.

“MC Somebody,” I hailed.

“Odogwu is not a guy name,” he said in Igbo.

I handed him the mic. I was now the third choice MC. He offered his hand, I shook it and turned to go.

“My brother,” he said, “this your hand is dry o.”

The audience laughed. “So teachers in Mount Sinai carry cement?”

More laughter. I shook my head and half-turned just as he began to dust cement off his palm. Cement existing only in his sick head.

Then the MC said, “Look at his shoe,” and the crowd laughed out lungs. I took all my will-power not to be paralyzed with embarassment as I was sure the 1,200 naira I paid for the shoes were showing. My face was set in a grimace that looked like a smile if you looked at it this way but the smile of an executioner if you looked at it the other way.

When I reached my stand, I looked up at the balcony and beckoned at no one in particular but only one person could it be, only one person could approach a wounded wolf still dripping blood.

Chisom came to me. “Tell Adaora and the girls their dance can go on.”

“Wow,” she said and made to say something but my face didn’t give her the room. She ran upstairs to share the good news.

I turned and faced the high table. The proprietress and the director were listening attentively at the comedian, the corners of their mouths itchy with laughter, with the left over of the laugh they laughed at me.

I wanted to spare them a scandal but not anymore. I beckoned again at the balcony and Chisom and Adaora approached. I asked them to get me the biggest boy in SS2. Each of them of wanted the other person to go do it while she kept me company, to console me or something.

“Chisom get the guy. Adaora go to the VP office’s door and get me his padlock.”

I gave the six-footer boy the padlock. “There is a place they have stored food in the primary school section,” I told him. He made to say something but I was quicker. “Lock it for me whether there is somebody in there or not.” He nodded and left.

No one would take a grain of rice from that place until my class was provided for/food.

“Nonsense people.”

To be continued…