Occasional Tales

Or, A Farewell to Weekends. We’re on the third day of the mocks. While students may get all anxious about the exams, at least they have something to do to relieve the tedium. Yesterday afternoon I had to force myself to keep my eyes open during the Maths exam or I would’ve shut them and fallen asleep. There’s a certain grumpiness in the office which has much to do with the cavalier treatment of weekends. As I’ve said before, I’ve long wished we’d just get the official breaks so that we then don’t end up doing seven-day weeks afterwards (or before). On top of that, the InterBac teachers are having one of their Saturdays plundered for some sort of meeting here. In addition, there’s more training in Shanghai in June to which we’ve been invited and which we’re expected to attend even if it’s theoretically optional. I don’t think the dull weather is helping much, either. We need a decently long spell of blue skies, sunshine, and warm temperatures. I’ve been marking the first

Columns. The Ass classes are meant to be writing a column on gαy marriage. I had Ass β in the computer room  for a double (split by lunch) yesterday. Wise but lazy students posted nothing. Less wise but just as lazy students posted something. One moron wrote one word every two minutes and another wrote one word every four minutes. A third clown posted the entry which he should’ve posted on the first occasion I got them to do some blog writing. There were also two girls who decided that SATs were more important than the class after lunch. No, you cretins, SATs are of secondary importance to all else. Go join an AP programme or go to the States and attend high school there where they matter; otherwise stop wasting class time with something that’s neither relevant nor important. What annoyed me about these two was the excuse that they didn’t know what to write. They have several articles from the Guardian and a list of features which characterise a column. They have plenty of m

Swings and roundabouts. We’ve already had two more timetable changes and the new term has barely started. The good (of you want to call it that) is that my Wednesday and Thursday are largely free, and the better is that I’ve lost two pre-AL β classes, which may be connected to the lack of an extra economics / business teacher. The bad is Friday with 8 classes. We’re also getting a new leader. Their lordships decided to send Mr Foucault to another local school. At the moment, I know next to nothing about the new leader. I hope that the transition is smooth and we don’t get someone who either tries to remake everything in his own image from the start or tells us that he’s going to leave well alone, but doesn’t. He’s new to the Empire, but he is coming from another Asian country with a socially retarded government, and may not find that things are a lot different. Not everything is back to normal. We’re short one teacher, but I’m not sure what the situation is there. Seems