State of Emergency

Kindergarten was certainly an interesting time. I suppose I really don't even remember much from my kindergarten years and even my new class of four and five year old kids isn't really jogging much memory. I imagine, if I haven't changed too much, that I was most likely just as much a pain in the ass in my kindy years as I think I might be now. But the more I search for some long purged memories of the beginnings of my lifelong pursuit of knowledge the more I start to feel embarrassed because I see how random and inexplicable kindergartner's actions can be.

Let's start with Katrina. Katrina is a nice girl who is only five years old and already has a prettiness about her that will surely get her attention throughout her life. (I have come to suspect that her mother may even give her slight applications of makeup before she comes to class. This could be the reason for her habitual tardiness.) Katrina doesn't have that "go get 'em" attitude that is shocking to see in some of the other young overachievers in the class. Katrina prefers the pursuit of boys. Where others in the class crave knowledge or desire to have every moment of every class be set to some sort of jumpy Disneyesque song and dance; Katrina simply wants all the attention from the boys who hardly know how to pull their pants up past their bare little asses after peeing without falling over, let alone how to respond to the flippant behavior of a tiny member of the opposite sex, of whom they also don't quite understand. Nothing excites Katrina more than being hugged or receiving interest from her fellow male classmates.

Today Katrina asked me if she could go to the bathroom to which I curtly replied, "no, we are having class!" (I think the strict Asian educational standards are subtly becoming a part of my general teaching philosophy.)Katrina was fine until about a minute later when I saw her head bouncing around past the shelves separating the seating areas of the classroom. I stopped class again to ask "Katrina, what are you doing?" Katrina's answer was nothing verbal but simply the action of slowly and cautiously raising her arm to reveal a pair of recently doo doo stained panties. My reaction would most likely be categorized as profound and utter horror. Katrina thought that as the teacher I might want her newly manufactured A-bomb but she was quite ill-informed as I wanted nothing to do with her little "death present." Of course none of the little children saw anything wrong with Katrina walking around wearing nothing below her waist, and it was only I who was growing pale and terrified as this horrendous nightmare was quickly becoming more of a reality.

As these stories often go, my Chinese teacher, and helper of all things dirty, was absent when I needed her the most. I tried to calm my nerves and think of a rational and sensible solution to this disgustingly strange predicament but I couldn't collect my thoughts and Katrina was creeping ever closer to me with that little stick of dynamite clasped in her cold clammy hands. So, when no other idea sprung to mind, I ran out of the classroom and closed the door behind me leaving 14 kindergartners and a 15th half dressed time bomb alone in a classroom together.

I peeked in through the window as if I was watching a failed bomb tech unit fight to be let out before the misfiring explosive went off with them inside. I checked the outside of the class and couldn't see anyone who might like to tackle this horrific responsibility for me. I started to picture all of the things that would have to happen between myself and Katrina in order to get her "class ready" again and the image made me so weak in the knees I almost fell over. To think of the strange angles and positions and the mortifying questions I would have to ask made me wish that I could jump off the roof and relieve myself of these doody duties.

I was finally able to calm down and I went next door to my co-worker's class. He was sitting in a nice happy little circle with his students reviewing the week's phonics lesson and all his kids appeared to be attentive and intrigued. I quickly interrupted the mood with my stuttering, "Kakakakakatrina just crapped her pants and is wawawawawalking around half naked in the classroom!" Everyone in the class began with a most unhelpful and hysteric laughter brought on by their "supportive" teacher.

To my luck his Chinese teacher was still in the class and informed me that my teacher had gone downstairs to do some paper work. Well I needed a different kind of paper work done and it involved using that paper in dark ways that still make me shutter. I repeated my indelicately formed sentence that should never have been used in front of a group of young minds whose every English action is derived from the inspiration and examples of their teachers. The Chinese teacher immediately snapped into "let's clean up the shit mode" and was ready to help.

We entered the city of New Chernobyl aka my classroom, myself a couple of feet behind my savior of dirty deeds, and the students had now discovered their freedom and were going a little bit past bat shit crazy all over the classroom. Whatever kind of order I may have had earlier with the children was like Katrina's soiled panties: destroyed and completely irreplaceable.

The teacher escorted the young Katrina out of the classroom and I was left to a most disagreeable smell and an even more obnoxious group of rowdy children who I now feared had just as volatile bowls as their classmate and former nice pants owner. For the rest of the day I was sending children out at even the slightest uncomfortable movement that I detected might lead to their pant legs becoming a slide to a river more dangerous than the Amazon and Nile combined. One student even confusedly replied, "but teacher Andrew, I don't need to go potty" as I sent him to the bathroom for a gesture he made of squeezing his little pecker in what I thought was an effort to "plug the pipes."

I was indeed helped by more experienced and thus more irritated personnel and the day started to resume a relatively comfortable tone again. I restored some aspect of calm to the class but was forced to initiate a coloring activity because all hope was lost at learning anything comparatively important.

However suddenly, while pacing around the classroom trying to think of new and unique compliments to put smiles on each individuals face, I tripped over what I thought was a chair leg.

Oh no, it was a real leg.

It was Katrina's leg.

It was Katrina, whose sickness had evolved from crap in the pants to throwing up in the recyclables waist basket as the rest of the students happily colored a Cinderella scene. (We are learning about our favorite fairy tales in this unit. This is not my favorite fairy tale.) Katrina was apparently quite sick and yet displayed some sort of amazing skill that enabled her to separate her physical from her mental. I hadn't noticed that she was puking because she had been kidding around and laughing with one of the boys in the class in between purges. Katrina was managing to be flirtatious while vomiting in her panties free and new shorts attire.

I asked Katrina if she was OK, shocked at the circumstances I couldn't begin to comprehend, and she gave a confused look and cutely responded, "I OK. Why?"

Before I could prepare a comment or bounce off such a hilariously content response Katrina slammed the top of the waist basket down, put a smile on her face, and hopped in line to go to lunch as if nothing had happened.

Now imagine the times when perhaps you were feeling sick from the top end or the bottom end. Visualize the agony and discomfort that you felt as if the sickness would never end and would only become increasingly worse as seconds in your miserable life ticked by. Picture that the only comfort was perhaps the idea of someone hitting you over the head with an object heavy enough to send you away from your utterly wretched condition forever. Try to envision having that sickness through both ends in front of all your friends and your educator and you might be able to understand what it was like in Katrina's shoes this day.

And how did she she act through all this? It was as if she was just going about her boring tasks finding them not agonizing but rather a slight disruption to her coquettish wanderings with the boys of the class. I don't know where Katrina will go in her life or what she will become, but if I am in any way an effective teacher and get her to understand and enjoy English the whole rest of the world will find out.