Jew or not a Jew?

stop me if you've heard this one...
a man walks into an education office for an interview.
he meets with a lady and she asks him 3 questions:
"Do you have a HKID card?"
"Do you have any teacher training?"
"Do you have any teaching experience?"
The man, somewhat defeated, responds "No" to all 3.
The lady pauses for a moment, then says "When can you start!?"

it looks like i really impressed with that subbing duty on Saturday, as they have now extended actual full courses my way. in fact, i just returned from my first lesson as part of said course. allow me to break it down for y'all.

it's an 'intro to journalism' class, where the students will go through the process of creating their own school magazine, from design, to photography, layout and writing.
neato!
i'm actually quite excited about the material, as i never had the chance to be part of one of those super cool high school newspaper teams we all remember from 90's TV. eat your heart out, Zuckerman.
i received all of the course materials the night before, and unlike last time, i was sober and eager to review. class couldn't start soon enough.

one catch, of course, is that the school is FAR. i'm talking New Territories far, kids. though that region likely doesn't mean much to anyone back home, with a name like that, it just screams 'why the hell would you go there?' it's in a town called Fanling, and i have definitely never been this far away from the safety of Hong Kong Island. i was probably another 15mins away from mainland China.
no worries though, my work contact tells me there's a direct bus from Wanchai, get me there in just over an hour. fair enough.
yet, for it to be a 'direct bus', there actually needs to be a mother f'n bus. standing at the bus stop like a jerk for about 45 mins, seeing every other bus come and go about 5 times over...and yet still no #373 to speak of. Rich is starting to get concerned. flip my assistant a text to let her know of my difficulties and she talks me through it.
the result?
4 MTR lines, 13 MTR stops and a $150 taxi ride later, i finally arrive at the school 15 mins late. and although i realize this isn't a life&death type of gig, i definitely owe it to these aspiring beat reporters to be there on time. and i failed. at least next time i know what to do.

belated, the class gets going and what a difference a few days make. these kids couldn't be any better behaved. finally, some attentive students facing forward and not throwing their pencil cases each and every way. i did have to speak up a little as i introduced myself though, as the school band practices right next door with glee. decided to ditch the 'Mr Rich', opting for 'Mr Morgan'- the phonetics making much more sense.
i reiterate, the kids are listening...it's brilliant.
i even brought along some real-life materials for discussion - Aline's 'US' vs. My/Atila's 'Rolling Stone'. the class was eating it up.
took a slight detour for a second, when i questioned the merits of archaic print magazines to the super hot digital iPad editions...but figured that could be saved for another day. next, i explain the various roles of a magazine team, from editor to coffee-fetching interns. i ask everyone to get into teams of 4 and appoint roles for the creation of their own magazine company.

things are going well, and i start on my personal tour of the classroom...it's all about 'connecting' with these honour rollers.
a few general questions about the roles, and then i was stopped by a student who had a really pressing question for me -

Student (in broken English) - "Sir, are you a joo?"
Me - "I'm sorry, I didn't hear you, can you repeat?"
Student - "Are you joo?"
Me (still not getting it)) - "I'm sorry, a what?"
Student (turning this into a spelling exercise) - "J-E-W."

yikes.
apparently, the student made the comment based on my nose.
now, don't get me wrong, i certainly don't condone racial profiling in any way, but that's not the point AT ALL.
do i really have a big nose?
shit.

with the awkward near-miss of the anti-Semitic portion of the lecture, the rest of the class was a breeze.
it actually flew by, and i was forced to give the kids homework (read: bastard).
a few kids stuck around after class, and nose notwithstanding, a few suggested that i could be, get this, a model....!
"huh, you kids are wise beyond your years...i'm actually looking to break into the...."

no. not yet, Rich. wait til they need a cover model for this mag....then we'll see who's a model teacher.

the duck likes nuts very much

this post is dedicated to all the teachers i've ever had or ever known.
you are truly saints.

let me back up to Friday night.
it's 5pm, and i'm glued to all of the devastation unfolding in Japan.
insane.
at the time, it still wasn't completely clear just how bad it was/would turn out to be.....and i'll admit to briefly thinking of the possibility of a tsunami coming down this way.
fortunately, this did not come to fruition.

the reason for this preface is so i don't sound like a total a-hole when i tell you i turned off CNN 30 mins later to jump in a taxi, on route to the HSBC employee-bar. no disrespect to the tragedy unfolding, simply a few bankers needing a pint and i got the call. as we pulled up to HQ, i unintentionally short-changed the cabbie while at the same moment receiving a ring on my mobile. it was Queenie (real name) from the English teaching company i was referred to, looking for a last minute sub to teach a Saturday morning class.
"Queenie, i'm in."

now, you may ask if, in fact, i have any teaching experience?
that would be a very definitive no.
no teaching, no teacher's college, not even a camp councilor gig for god's sake. no, the closest i suppose i've ever been to teaching would be playing 'manager' for creative teams in the advertising game. not really the same thing.

cut back to the evening - a few pints at the bank, a bottle of wine down the road, a small dinner, and another couple of beers and our Friday night was fully completely. get home, and with eyes nearly wide shut, i open the email with tomorrow's teaching materials attached. ah, looks easy enough, it's English for children, i'll be fine. at that point, i was more concerned with how long it was going to take to get to the school, which just happens to be at the very far end of HK in a place called Tsuen Wan.
need sleep. deal with it tomorrow.

8am - rise & shine, teach! i shake last night's haze off, pick out what i consider 'teacher gear', and set on out. as soon as i jumped on the MTR, i counted the stops til my destination - 15, plus a short mini-bus ride to follow.
fantastic.

to be honest though, i was happy i had the time to review exactly what i was going to be teaching. yes, i was a little nervous. not for the fact of having to get up in front of a classroom full of kids...that's easy enough. it was more the idea that i still wasn't really sure what the hell i was supposed to be instructing, given i had received multiple PDFs of course material. it reminded me of that dream we all have, when you've somehow forgotten to attend a class all year and then realize you have an exam that day. deer in headlights, not a good look.

nerves settled down though once i arrived and met up with my assistant for the day, Lucy. she told me not to fret, that each class (i had 2 different levels that day) had the printed materials in the room and there was a specific lesson from the material to be taught.
ok, let's do this.

P1 aka "Terror Tots"
my first class was P1, which i was lead to believe is 6-7 yr olds. the protocol is to gather your class, who were all lined up in the open air mezzanine (good start) and take them up to the room. aside from the 'no running!' i needed to throw out early and often, i figured this was going to be easy. i actually started to think more about my teacher 'schtick', including writing "Mr. Rich" on the chalkboard and looking desperately for a ruler or a pointer...a standard teacher 101 tool.
unfortunately, i fear the kids saw right through the act. i barely had a chance to pick up the chalk i'd broken after scribbling my name down that the madness began. 20 kids, in theory here to learn English but obviously not interested in doing anything but yelling/poking/wrestling etc. apparently most had also downed a 2L tetrapak of Vitasoy prior to class, asking in sequence to go to the toilet. no joke. it was all going downhill before it began, and Mr. Rich was perhaps going to crack if not for the kid in the front row. finger in nose. pulling out the merchandise. i smiled to myself....let's begin.
it wasn't easy, but i got through it. i don't know if any of the kids truly learned much from their workbooks, but to be honest, i feel like half the battle is simply for them to soak up the English words that are coming out of my western mouth. i did the walk-around, interacting with little pockets of the kids vs. trying to engage them all from the front. we even finished off with a riveting game of 'Simon says', where i unleashed the patented 'Simon says - go to sleep'.
One down, one to go.

P4-P6 aka "Older & Wiser"
Same routine as before, more or less. Smaller class fortunately, of kids aged 10-12ish. generally speaking, they were much easier to handle aside from the 2 rowdy boys in the back. there was even a super keener girl at the front of the class, the type of student i probably would have made fun of as a peer, now as a teacher, i call her 'the golden child'. they all made a presentation of what they liked to do on weekends, not one of them mentioning how much they enjoyed English class on Saturdays. we finished strong with a game of hangman, then ring the bell - school is out.

all-in, aside from the slight headache, it was a unique experience and one that i will certainly carry fond memories for. i'm actually hoping that more teaching opportunities will come my way, as it was indeed a paid gig. going to put in a request for gym class next though...and the kids will forever let it be known as "Hangin' with Mr. Rich".