Standing In The Sun

Friday 3rd July 2009
The week just gone was not such a bad one. Only one bad day, and that was the Saturday which so often IS a bad day these days anyway. But when it IS a bad day now, it seems to REALLY be bad and not just a little bit bad. Not worth going into details about Saturday because it was the usual thing of me trying to get the lesson going and them having their Big Discussion which means that the presence of me in the room is non-existent. And as usual it centres around a group or a few individuals.

But there was drama this week. Oh YES! And THIS time it was not of my making.

You will recall a few weeks ago now that I was off sick with my flu-ish thing. Three teachers were used to substitute for me. One of them enjoyed his time there and was liked by my students. One of them, who only took the class for one lesson only and spent much of the time shouting and bellowing at them, did NOT enjoy his time. And the third teacher seemed, so I thought, to have got on alright (but now I have my doubts because of what I've heard about him).

However …. Saturday at almost the end of Lesson 4 we had a visitor. Actually on THAT day there were four interrupting visitors. Days like this happen as you know. In THIS case it was another visitor of some distinction and of rank 'one crown and one star' (sorry but I don't know my Saudi army insignia).

So he came in at about five or ten minutes to 11 which is almost the end of the day. I don't know what he expected from such a meeting, but he said he wanted to talk to me for a moment outside the classroom. WHY do they ALWAYS have to come and crash my lesson like that?? Because they CAN – that's the answer, and because they're army and because they run the show around here. And pfffft to it all, but there you go.

He had received a long memo from our HoD which he showed me. I'd had no idea of such a memo being written and I, for sure, hadn't said anything to make it happen. The gist of the memo was that, “These soldier boy students are an unruly bunch, how are we expected to teach them? And anyway they all fail when they come through the system. And their discipline level is low and etc. etc.”.

Well, yes, this is actually true. But it didn't come from me. The HoD shows little interest in what we do over with these soldier boys. So WHO had made it happen and WHY was it being dealt with in THIS way?

The thing is, if this guy wanted to deal with this matter properly then some proper time should have been scheduled to talk about it. Not ten minutes to the end of the teaching day and certainly NOT in class time. But they don't respect that. I don't know what he expected from me as I knew nothing of this memo having been written. I had not been consulted either. So WHO exactly was making judgements on the classes?

Well, I told him, yes they can be difficult and yes they have good and bad days. I also said that this year was not the only time that such trouble occurred. Not interested in other years, the man said. Surely it was relevant since such behaviour is not new as I have heard much about. Yes, I HAD had some discipline problems, I added, but these had been dealt with (I was referring to the key-throwing incident).

That was about all I said. No names mentioned and no specifics given. Back in the classroom they wanted to know what I had talked about. I told them that it was only general stuff and that was about it. I also said that I mentioned no names.

Fast forward a little to Monday morning in the lesson. First it was my teaching colleague who informed me that all the students had been standing out in the sun for two hours the previous afternoon after classes. Standing in the SUN?? Yes, I'd heard that they do that sort of thing around here. Into the classroom and yes indeed – the students confirmed this. “Because of that man yesterday”, they said.

That was not the end. The next day, Tuesday, they said that AGAIN they'd been two-plus hours in the sun. Standing there, caps ordered off, face up to the sun. Then exercise, crawling around on the concrete soldier-style and more of same.

OK, now I'll say this. Although there IS a problem with this class and indeed with these soldier boy classes in general, this is NOT THE WAY to solve it. Punishment versus Rehabilitation I guess is what it's all about. Plus copious amounts of sadism and so-called “discipline” hoping that THIS will teach them to not do it again next time.

I'll tell you what it has done. First of all, I had a class of students who were feeling (and excuse the non-intended pun here) very much under the weather all day. More sleepers than usual in the classroom. And a VERY angry bunch of people who now wanted to know WHO had caused all this to happen. Having established that it was neither myself nor my colleague, they were then pointing the Finger Of Blame at one of those teachers who had taken my class when I was off ill. And the one they most suspected was the first teacher who had shouted and yelled them so much.

“What is his name? Where does he live”, they wanted to know from me. What the hell were they going to do?? I was having no part in any vendetta here so I just said his name which they were never going to remember anyway.

Even at the end of the week they were still being given this sun treatment. Ah no, all except the Wednesday when they told me that it had stopped. One of my students said they had complained during all this sun exercise and so he was going to be in the “jail” for a while. Came back into class Wednesday middle with the blue finger which meant he had been fingerprinted and classified and processed. Others seemed too to have had trouble because of answering back and stuff.

Well now, THAT is a part of the army which everyone knows you must not cross into. Answering back or questioning orders is always going to be dealt with severely as it would be in any army in the world. THAT is fair enough.

But what of the sun punishment? Well, as I have said already, this is, in my opinion, NO WAY to solve the problem. In fact, when the temperature is in the mid-forties celsius it is downright DANGEROUS! Those guys could dehydrate, get nasty sunstroke and other such things! Sunstroke can even KILL if it is serious enough. I've only had it a few times in my life, but it REALLY is unpleasant.

I have heard that the possible writers of this memo are two in number. The shouter teacher and the third teacher who had them on my second day away. And, apparently, he is not so cool, calm and laid back as he seems to be. The word is that he gets very uptight with such discipline problems and cannot take much of it. He is on a very low number of teaching hours. I have EVEN heard that he lost one other job in this country possibly due to this. And, in addition, he was heard to be complaining a lot that my class was a really bad lot and that if he had this class himself then he would quit the job at once.

Hmm …. well I can't say that I haven't thought in that way. When those boys are at their worst, when they just won't be quiet or when they are having one of their heated discussions amongst themselves then they will NOT shut up and I certainly cannot make them. Then I feel like I'm not even there, I don't want to be there, they descent into total chaos and I feel like I want to quit-and-run there and then. But then when they are OK, then it is better for everyone. There have been a lot of bad times lately for me in that class it is true. But then there are times when they're quite agreeable too although this does not mean they work any better! But if they were at that worst ALL THE TIME then really I would not stand it and WOULD be going crazy and thinking of exiting. And I have written plenty about THAT since I started with them more than two months ago.

HOWEVER …. perhaps what they need is a proper motivation to be there and maybe incentives to learn more. We all know full well that they don't NEED to be here learning English however much you can justify it as being a “Foundation Course” for medical school next year. Marks they get in the tests I give them don't seem to matter to them. So what IS the motivation to learn more English? And HOW is this sun punishment going to suddenly make them better?

I am not the guy in charge so I do not decide what happens.

Ah, one more thing. This 'crown and star' guy in charge came out, on successive days, to sit with me at break time to have a chat. Nothing much, just small talk really. He seems to have been in England for some period of time. Some mentions of if I needed to drive then he might be able to help with the “paperwork” here ….

The students obviously saw him sitting with me chatting and wanted to know what he was talking about. I told them it wasn't much. But in any case, I was not going to be caught in the middle of loyalties to anyone. And was not going to be seen to be taking sides.

Next week the students are on holiday. FREEDOM for a while, and the chance to relax a bit.

A Woman is like a Banana ....

Friday 3rd July 2009
A woman is like a banana!”. Yes, my friends, these were the wise words from the mouths of one student this week. Don't know how we came to be talking about bananas. Ah, probably because I now have bananas with my coffee every day. Yes, that must be it.

He didn't say, but I suppose this is one of the wise words of the Qu'ran. No, I haven't read it so let's take his word for it.

The way he explained it was this. Oh, and it goes without saying that mainly he was referring to Arab women:

Like a banana, a woman is covered up. In her case, it is the long, black 'abbaya' clothing she wears and the banana, in turn, has its yellow banana skin. Only one person can eat this banana, and when the banana is yours then you, and only you, can peel back the banana skin and see and enjoy the banana inside. This banana is, therefore, yours alone and nobody else may have this banana.

And, I assume, you may not share your banana with anyone else. And, I also assume, you are not allowed to have more than one banana at a time. But that was unclear.

As beautiful and thought-provoking this philosophy is, it is full of flaws.

Oh, he also went on to say that because western women are not covered up, then they, like a banana once you open it, can go bad after a while because it is outside its skin. As in, a banana going brown and ripening too much once peeled.

Now, what would he say about me? I love bananas and every day I have three or four or sometimes even more. In one sitting I might consume two or three at a time. And for SURE this has no relation WHATSOEVER to me and women. If THAT was paralleled, then I would not have any bananas at all and the last banana I had would have been nearly two years ago.

Well, and the banana I briefly had some of last time in Krakow, Poland ....

Coca-Cola? No thanks, I'm Saudi!

Wednesday 24th June 2009
I wanted to do the Passive Voice with the students last week. There is a very nice unit in Headway Pre-Intermediate involving the History Of Coca Cola which breaks it down well and I have lifted it out of Headway before to use. Thought it would work well with this often-tricky grammar point.

Started the class well with a Coca-Cola brainstorm. Associations, things they knew about it etc. etc. The usual things came up like it was nice but not good (for you). I did wonder why they had said it was “not good” but assumed it was a simple error meaning “not good FOR YOU”.

I was going too use the Coca Cola text from the book and I'd prepared a nice worksheet to go with it involving True/False, vocab questions and comprehension questions. First I gave out the text which I had photocopied which was to be used first for reading for gist type activities and then more.

I was quite pleased with what I'd prepared. It is a very good unit on introducing the Passive which can be tricky for low level students.

However, soon after giving out there were murmurings in the corner which grew louder and louder.

I carried on. The class is often like this and they often have their own little conversations which are nothing to do with my lesson. It's how they are. But I soon found out these were different.

One of them spoke up. “Teacher I won't do this! I am Muslim and Coca-Cola is from Israel and bad”. He threw it down on the desk. Another joined in also showing his contempt of it and distaste of what I was trying to do.

I did not understand. Then I noticed that there were pictures of Coca-Cola bottles with the writing in different languages, ie, non English alphabet. OOPS, I thought, maybe one of those is Hebrew and yes, for SURE they would object to THAT.

No, it was not that. Well, I did not quite understand what the objection was. But it was a strong one and when that happens here, you just have to abandon what you're trying to do so as not to offend them. That is the way here. If you do something which can offend, then you can find yourself in big trouble.

I had to abandon it. My great lesson on the Passive was destroyed. Quickly I had to think of another way to do it, but by then they had been stirred up enough. Even with my attempted recovery where I used my pen and tried to ask questions like, “Where is it made? Who makes it? Do we know or need to know?”, was rather in vain.

Lesson break time came and I had to know more. Outside in the 'break area' I called over one of the 'objectors' to explain what all this Coca-Cola thing was all about.

He got me to write the words, “Coca Cola”, on a piece of paper. Then he put a line through the “l” in “Cola” and then said to turn the paper over. Read the words “Coca Cola” now backwards, ie, right-to-left as in Arabic, and probably squint a lot and maybe with the stylised way that “Coca Cola” is written. Of course, you have to read it as Arabic script and not just as backwards English letters.

What you get then is, apparently, something in Arabic resembling, “No Mohammad and No Makkah” which is, of course, totally 'HARAM' (forbidden / blasphemous).

So where is the connection with Israel? Well, NOW I need explanation help from the internet.

The association of Coca-Cola and Israel goes back more than 30 years. Not only the Coca Cola company but other big western names too like McDonald's.

Have a look at THIS entry in Wikipedia which gives the basics of Coca-Cola and its problems in the Arab world. Their problems started in the mid-1960's when they opened a bottling plant in Tel-Aviv. Wikipedia goes on to say, “In response, the Arab League boycotted Coca-Cola from August 1968 to May 1991, as part of the economic boycott of Israel."

So that didn't help their image here. And now to the issue of the alleged anti-Islamic messages in the Coca-Cola logo script. For THAT may I refer you to this Coca-Cola article in Snopes.com.

I have also found this forum and one of the forum threads is also about the Coca-Cola backwards Arab script issue. You can read it here but, being a forum, it may well disappear at some time.

So there you go! According to the 'rumour', if you flip over the stylised Coca-Cola logo and kind of move it around a bit, it resembles this most blasphemous of phrases for Arabic speakers.

Interesting. And what is MORE interesting is that you can buy and drink Coca-Cola here quite freely and no need to look over your shoulder for someone cursing you from behind.

And THAT is one of the things that is just SO ODD about being here – the contrast of what you SHOULDN'T do and what, in reality, IS happening. If Coca-Cola so offends them then WHY do they have it here? My students said about it that, yes, they do buy it and drink it but with clenched teeth and, I suppose, a troubled mind.

Food for thought. Or should that be DRINK??

Thinking Time(s) .....

Sunday 21^st June 2009

What IS the purpose in having a blog, I wonder? Is it to rant? To complain? To record the progress of your days/weeks/months in a strange new place. Why DO I write this blog and why, just lately, am I writing less than in the past?

Hehe! Yes, OK, my friends you are right. I'm in a “What To Do?” moment here since I am without my Mobily internet tonight. My choice of Things To Do is either watch David Attenborough, go get some more tea, get an EXTREMELY early night, play (maybe) Sims 3 on my phone (want to play FIFA Manager but it's stuck again and I gotta start afresh!! Ohh and I had SUCH a good team!!).

Or …. do what I enjoy doing. And that is to sit and write. It is something that keeps me going, an outpouring of feelings good (not much) and bad and will form a record of my time here in this strange land long after I return. Maybe it will be worth publishing. I would buy one anyway!

Digress Digress Digress. Should have been my middle name.

Anyway …. after last week's mayhem there is a feeling building up inside me. And it is not a positive one.

I knew, of course, that being here would not be easy. Alone and only having one aim in mind is not the best way to pass 12 months.

I feel things are slipping away from me. Positivity is a small thing here and what I have of it is dwindling.

Imagine if I had no internet. No contact with the outside world, with my friend and family out there.

No No NOOOO!! Better NOT imagine!! For it is THIS and pretty much this ALONE which keeps the wolf from my door. With my internet “life” I have something to look forward to. I have people who are GLAD to see me every day and evening when I log on to my Skype account. They are a VITAL part of what keeps me going. I don't only mean family back in England – I also mean friends old and new who are out there and who are pleased to see me.

Online life is a blessing and a curse in one package. Without it we are stuck ONLY in the small environment we live in day to day. It is an 'extension' and, indeed, a compliment to our regular live at work and enhances our social lives. Many people we meet online becomes the best of friends. Even though they are often far away, it is always a pleasure to see them.

As the song from the sitcom “Cheers” used to go, “Sometimes You Want To Go Where Everybody Knows Your Name And They're Always Glad You Came!”. And THAT encompasses life on the web chat lands.

However … of course many of you will say, “Yes, but the internet cannot be a REAL substitute for REAL LIFE! We can get hooked on it and lock the outside world, the REAL world out of sight! It can make us crazy!”

Crazy I would NOT agree with. Of course, every normal person has a life outside the web too. Start chatting with someone new from your town and you EXTEND your social circle, not decrease it.

But then there are those you might talk to who are far away that you have little chance of meeting.

Perhaps you really want to. And THIS is where web chat can frustrate and annoy.

The way I see it is this. I am keeping in touch with people I used to know from Poland. And in addition, I am getting to know NEW people. I am “laying new ground” which will make for something to VERY MUCH look forward to when I am finally out of here and back into what I know (and that will NOT be longer than one year!). Having done the groundwork, I will then be much closer, geographically, to these people. I will then be ready and will not be starting in a totally new environment with nothing and no-one as a 'base'.

I think I'm babbling a bit here and am now wondering what the hell I'm writing about. So back to my feelings right now.

Loneliness. I've known it plenty these past few years. Coming to a country like Saudi Arabia, you need all the social 'avenues' you can get. I had zero to start with and the other teachers presented few new ones. They all do their own things which, mostly, involves staying at home. It has only been, up to now, the teacher colleague I arrived with who has presented any kind of friendship.

I consider myself fairly easy-going, but in a place like this it is almost impossible to maintain that. Anyone whop has read my blog so far and SURVIVED it can understand me on THAT I hope. Plus in the last few years with events in my personal life going “pear shaped”, it has made me less tolerant and much more unsettled in myself and in where I am and where I want to be.

Yes, I don't like it here. No, I don't keep my mouth shut about it. No, I don't tolerate it. Yes, maybe I SHOULD but I don't feel I can since it is all too new, too foreign and too different. Should I just ACCEPT what I have here (or don't have here) and try and make the best of it?

Well, I can't.

It's the isolation. The fact that we really CAN'T get out of this compound and go easily into town and do the normal things we can back home. Not without the expense and inconvenience of a taxi ride both ways.

Yes, maybe I had it too good where I was before where all I had to do was take a short, straight-line wander into town to enjoy all there. And where at weekends, even when there was little else to do, I could at LEAST take a walk round and explore some new parts of the town. And have a leisurely coffee while I was at it.

It was a hard thing to give up. I did it for one reason only – MONEY! NOT a good reason but I felt I had no choice at that time and I felt I could not go on with the money struggle that was taking over my life.

I HAD to do something and coming here was what I did.

Was it a mistake to make a decision based almost entirely on financial need (and some might even say “greed”)?

I have just got to the 'calendar end' of my third month here. And how SLOWWWWWLY the time has passed, and how LITTLE I have done here. And, I must say, how little I am LIKELY to do here except earn nice money and not spend it.

Many of you, struggling back in Europe under the current recession will say, “Well be THANKFUL you have a job at ALL in these difficult times!”, or, “Why complain about good money?”, or even, “You made a good decision ducking out of Europe at a time like this!”.

My teaching colleague now does his own thing. I have spent the last two weekends doing the weekly shop and drinking coffee and eating cake on my own.

Perhaps he is tired of my negativity and pessimism. Well he and his 'false optimism' is ALSO annoying. He goes on pretending he's having a good time and is not worried about a thing here. He puts on this front for everyone and yet he DOES dislike it here and DOES complain and DOES get frustrated just like most people do. So WHY pretend it isn't happening? Why pretend you're having a good time when nothing IS happening? He knows, as well as I do, that the only weekend entertainment likely is shopping mall based. And yet he said he “enjoyed” it when two weekends ago he spend the WHOLE DAY in the Ikea store.

One thing I do NOT like is false optimism and people who pretend. And then those SAME people try to tell me not to be so negative and that I should relax and take it EASY more.

But EVERY WEEK there is SOMETHING NEW that unsettles me. I try to get into a 'survival routine' here but I cannot because some new thing comes along to disrupt that. This business with the locked gate. Yes, that problem seems to be solved now with the bus that we get. But I didn't WANT or NEED this disruption. The gate was fine, it was useful, many other people used it too so WHY mess things up?

I DO try to keep hold of positives but they keep slipping away. No internet this week – this is YET ONE MORE thing to annoy the HELL OUT OF ME!!

When I think about the summer, it seems like a great oasis. Such a great sense of freedom I will feel when I am on that plane taking off from the airport in either Bahrain or Dammam.

I will feel like I am back in paradise.

It will be VERY hard to come back in late September. VERY VERY hard!!

Been thinking about that a LOT recently, and especially after all that shit last week.

Why should I HAVE TO suffer all this? I don't WANT TO be in this compound 'prison' for the next nine months (OK, so it's eight if you take away my holiday!). I don't LIKE IT here and I am never GOING TO like it. I want to be where I can ENJOY life again – not SUFFER for my money!

Could I easily get a job in September elsewhere? Hah – now THIS is the question!

In theory the answer is yes because I've done it before.

But ….my CV is the problem here. I already have a gap in teaching work on it. And in addition, I ALSO have a short stay in my LAST job to explain away. And am I really considering ANOTHER early exit from a job??

What about references? And don't forget what that woman said about why SHE would not employ you again so soon (no, not HER! Another one!!)

I NEED to complete a good long-ish stint of teaching work to make my CV look better.

Yes, it IS possible that there are potential employers who would not mind about my recent job history and its breaks. But is it worth the risk? Maybe I should send out some CV's and “test the water”.

But I would be rather restricted to EU jobs where a visa is not needed since, to obtain work visas, I would need to be in my own country. Not practical.

Work-wise there are reasons why I must stay here. But it is really looking like a long haul ahead with very little localised social activity of any kind likely. Not even a coffee and chat in town.

Eight months of THAT?? Not sure I can take it.

Some of you may not think so, but I am a people person. I NEED the company of other people and I NEED places to go and things to do. And yes, this means too that I need money to do these things, and maybe that brings me back to why I am here.

But the only people I meet are those AT work and in the classroom. I see NOBODY now outside working hours at ALL. At least, no “live” people – only those I online chat with. And they come and go and are too far away anyhow.

Silence is deafening. Boredom is destructive. Do I need the money? Yes, but at what cost to MYSELF?

Do I wish I'd stayed where I was before coming here? In many ways yes. Though what I have heard about how things went after I left makes me glad I am not there now since my timetable would have collapsed completely. And that would have made me worry MORE about money.

From a social and living point of view, YES I DO wish I was still there. I had some good private students and would have had plenty more. And I had ….well, let's say another “good thing” developing on the “social” side of being there. Could have been so good! And I threw all that away!!

But when you are pressurized and under stress because of money then a decision HAS TO be made. And I DID make it and it brought me here.

What will the consequences be of that decision? Will I stay the distance?

I cannot say for sure now, though probably the answer is YES. But there is still more shit to come and this “boiled egg” head may yet crack under the strain.

Wish me luck!!