Have you ever had that public speaking nightmare?
You know the one.
You find yourself unexpectedly preparing to stand up in front of a crowd. You make your way to the podium, fumbling with papers and notes, feeling your heart beat race as thousands and thousands of little white dots stare at you from the darkened cavern that is the audience hall.
You steady yourself, take a breath, and completely forget everything you are supposed to say as invariably you happen to catch a glance downward to come to the terrifying realization you have no clothes.
You are naked, nothing to say, nothing to wear, unable to meet the expectations of the world glaring back at you.
Everyone who has been a teacher has had that experience before, and throughout Asia the feeling can be magnified a thousand times over when students aren’t culturally accustomed to engaging with their teachers the same way in many other parts of the world.
In much of Asia, teachers transmit, and students receive. Of course there are exceptions. And of course outside of the classroom the relationships teachers have with their class can be almost anything. Most of the time though, class is in session, and it's time to listen, not speak.
That scenario can be particularly daunting for foreign teachers, especially when the subject matter calls for a Socratic touch, at least from the teacher’s perspective. I’m not here to compare and contrast educational philosophies between the East and West though. It is enough to mention here that, no matter what a foreign teacher’s role may be, no matter how big or how small the job may seem, all of us who have been a teacher in Asia have been confronted off-guard, a class staring blankly back at you, and nothing you do can break their silent expectations.
There are times, situations, which arise when you immerse yourself in a foreign culture where none of your background and experience can help guide your judgment how to react. You are ‘naked’ in the face of the crowd watching you, and all you can do is fumble through based on your own feelings, hoping that you’ve read the room correctly, and feeling helpless when wanting to do more.
For me, I was confronted with a tragedy while working as a part time English teacher in Shanghai. It is a story I haven’t shared with many friends, only a handful of my closest confidants have heard it. The memory of the day has softened with time, but that feeling of helplessness, of being out of place, still comes back to me.
I had taken on a part time job to earn some extra cash while building out a street-fashion concept with a Chinese factory owner in the city. The concept was innovative for the time, partnering with local rising hip-hop stars in the ‘Shanghainese’ scene, working with designers to create a pop-up label in celebration of this new urban ‘street’ style.
This was more than 15 years ago, and long before the popularization of hip-hop and R&B in China went mainstream. At that time Beijing and the north were known for underground rock, metal bands and punk battling it out at late night hidden clubs. Shanghai, with its urban pride, cosmopolitan spirit, and foreign influence was much more focused on hip-hop and R&B, especially where rapping in Shanghainese won some regional pride and local respect over mandarin.
Most hip-hop artists in the Chinese speaking world grew out of Hong Kong and Taiwan, groups like LMF (Lazy Motha Fuckers), Nong Fu, and MC Yan incorporated Cantonese lyrics with styles brought to Hong Kong from the English speaking world. Taiwan’s underground scene had been thriving for years thanks to the large number of American Taiwanese bringing west coast, LA sounds back with them. Groups like LA Boyz introduced American urban sound to Taiwan, and LA born stars like David Tao, who grew up singing gospel in African American church congregations around the city, translated soul into a form that quickly was popularized on the island.
In China, censorship and a more conservative apprehension about rap’s influence on the youth, not unlike many arguments in the west at the time, hindered the early commercial growth of these new styles locally. That never stopped the underground music scene though, and my partner and I thought it would be a great opportunity to release some new, authentic style into what we believed would become a huge market.
Unfortunately for me, the risk also meant I needed to make some extra cash in order to stay afloat as we built our business, and so it was time to teach some English.
English teaching has a host of negative connotations in China, for very good reason. There is a very strong perception, deserved in many cases, that teachers would wash up in China after they had failed at their own lives in the west. This is an old perception, long time China hands in Hong Kong all remember the acronym ‘FILTH’ from the days before 1997, when lawyers and accountants could simply set-up shop in the colonial city by relying on their existing UK credentials. FILTH, Failed-in-London-try-Hong-Kong, embodied a general attitude in China and all across Asia where westerner’s could simply arrive and rely solely on a regionalised form of ‘white privilege’ to earn money and survive.
All of that was going through my head, and more, when I made the decision to find some extra teaching work. To push myself through my hesitation at the time, I reminded myself of one thing: all of the perceptions and connotations of being an English teacher may be true, but there is one audience who doesn't care about any of that….the kids you teach. They are going to have someone as an English teacher regardless of your choice, so you can do this for a while, and you can do it in a way that at least you honestly believe will give the kids some inspiration. They might not grow up speaking English, or even ever leaving Shanghai, but they can at least for that one hour at class have a chance to laugh and learn something new.
Luckily for me, being a fluent mandarin speaker, which most English teachers at the time were not, I was able to share my thoughts with my local Chinese co-teacher, let’s call her Sarah, a young lady who had just finished her education degree. I was also able to speak with parents directly, and learn a bit about their hopes and aspirations for their kids, especially in respect to their English lessons.
A lot can be argued about the methods some Chinese parents, and I do mean ’some’ as opposed to ‘all’, will use to get their kids to pass their exams and succeed in life. What you can not, and never should, doubt however, is that by and large Chinese parents care deeply about their children, and want them to have a well rounded education as much as anyone. The social pressure they face, the competition or perceived competition, however you frame the issue, is so overwhelming that the only achievable path to success is through ‘winning’ at the examination milestones everyone recognizes for success. This has been true for a millennia of Chinese history, and whether right or wrong, in all likelihood will never change.
By being able to communicate with Chinese parents and the school administrators, not being forced to rely on the school for my work permits and visas, and by keeping my goal of inspiring the kids first and front in my mind, I was able to have a fantastic teaching experience. I threw out the curriculum provided to me pretty much immediately, but after a week or two the school stopped objecting. They simply had Sarah teach the textbooks to the kids in a separate hour class once they realized some parents were recommending their friends to bring their children to the school for my lessons. As long as I kept the theme of the day relevant to the chapter we were on in their textbook, I was free to teach however I wanted.
The kids of course loved the whole experience, and they would go home singing little songs or talking with each other in English phrases we had practiced in class. One little girl, named Mandy, was particularly bright. She was always first to answer questions, first to volunteer when we performed little skits in class, and never wanted to leave school at the end of the day. Her mother was a very charming young lady in her late 20’s, an immigrant to Shanghai from Jiangsu, married to a well off factory owner in the outskirts of Shanghai’s Minhang district. She was always properly dressed, always eager to hear how her daughter was progressing in class, and even approached me for private lessons from time to time.
At the time I never thought twice about it, but now looking back, little Mandy’s attachment to school was different than her classmates. Sometimes her grandfather would pick her up, she would be hiding so that she didn’t have to go home. The other teachers and I always thought it was because of how much she enjoyed school. She even brought me a little present, some Chinese gold ingot chocolates similar to Chanukah-gelt chocolates in Jewish families, for good fortune on some holiday I can’t remember anymore, asking if she could have more lessons. All of her classmates loved her, and at the time I thought it was just a sign that my classroom philosophy was succeeding on some level.
One day, Mandy didn’t show up to class.
It was a strange morning, one of those days where you wake up on the wrong side of the bed, and nothing just seems to ‘fit’ the way it should. There was no particular reason for it, no emergency phone calls in the middle of the night, nothing broken, nothing hurt or sick….just a general feeling hanging in the air.
I biked myself to the school that morning, I always loved biking along the road, passing little rivers and bridges as I made my way through Shanghai’s unique and curious is of historical-chic and 1990’s postmodern design. Parts of Shanghai were designed and built with the aesthetic tastes of the foreign concessions of the previous century, with french contributions manifesting themselves in broad tree lined boulevards making an extremely pleasant character to the feel of parts of the city.
This morning though, I barely noticed any of it.
Something was bothering me, and I couldn’t tell what. When I arrived at the school, I locked my bike inside the back of the canteen area, the administrators let me do that so it wouldn’t be stolen on the street, a small privilege for a foreign teacher I am not ashamed to say I gladly accepted.
Sarah was not in a great mood, keeping to herself and sorting through the classroom prep-work that needed to be done before the bell rang and morning exercises started. I had already planned on leaving early that day, a festival in People’s Square was only a few weeks away, and we were planning on hosting a pop-event, a lot still needed to be done.
The bell rang, students started filing in, one of them asked me ‘Teacher, where’s Mandy? She said she would stand next to me at our exercises today but she wasn’t there.’
I looked down at her, her name was Apple which despite how many times I explained to her parents it wasn’t a proper English name, they laughed and said ‘she likes it.’
‘Don’t worry,’ I replied, ‘I’m sure it's nothing to worry about, let’s get class started and we’ll see her a bit later.’
We started our lessons, and almost immediately the principle of the school appeared at the classroom door, motioning for me to step outside. I glanced at Sarah, she waved me on to trade places, and I left the room to follow the principle.
We walked down to the courtyard and sat at a little bench. A police officer came and joined us, sitting down and politely offering a cigarette. I took it and introduced myself, not sure what was going on, and the police officer continued where he had left off before I arrived.
Was I in some sort of trouble for working at the school?
‘We were alerted to the situation late last night, around 3am. I’m sorry that you are being informed like this.’
‘What happened?’ I asked. ‘Have I done anything wrong?’
‘No,’ the policeman shook his head, ‘something has happened with one of your students. We spoke with your Chinese colleagues a little while ago, but the principle recommended that we speak to you privately because you are a foreigner.’
I looked at the principle, not sure of what to do next. I had always respected him, he was a decent man, maybe a little too focused on the profitability of the school from my perspective but he did earnestly believe in educating the students and giving them a wholesome experience.
‘The kids really love your class, ‘ he said, ‘and I know you have a good relationship with them. I wasn’t sure how to tell you about this, because I know that foreign culture can be different.’
‘Tell me what?’
The Policeman then took over. ‘Yesterday evening we were called to an apartment block by a man.’ He showed me a card that belonged to Mandy’s father. ‘We entered the room to find him broken down in the corner, inconsolable.’
‘We went into the bedroom, and found the bodies of his wife and daughter. The cause of death was poisoning by gas, apparently the mother had intentionally released the valve on the gas heater for the apartment’s shower to suffocate herself and the child. She was holding the little girl in her arms when we found her, there was a suicide note.’
I was shocked, struck dumb from the news. Thankfully, the principle must have realised how I was feeling, and explained further.
‘From the note, we learned that Mandy’s father had been having an affair. Their home life was not harmonious, and when her mother discovered some text messages on a phone in the house, she decided that she wanted to end her life. She did not want to leave Mandy with him, and made the decision to end her life.’
I looked back and forth, the only thing I could think of was the class upstairs. ‘What do we do now?’
‘You don’t need to worry, we have already explained the situation to Sarah and the other teachers, we think it is best that we let them explain to the other children when the time is right. We’ll be informing the other parents at the school as well so they can handle the news in their own way at home.’
‘Why would she do this? Mandy was a good student, all her classmates loved her, it doesn’t make sense to me.’
The principal and the policeman looked at each other. The principle grabbed a cigarette and sat back a little, lighting it himself in thought. They of course understood how common it was for men to have affairs in the city, especially businessmen. Neither of them understood exactly why Mandy’s mother would choose to take her daughter's life with them, but in the sometimes harsh world that was created by China’s breakneck speed of growth, family strain and emotional loss was something they understood and accepted more easily than I was ready to.
‘Sometimes it's best we don’t ask these questions, better to leave it be.’ The principle responded. I could see that there was much more to the context of the situation, but I was at a loss.
‘I guess I’ll go back up and resume class. I’ll let Sarah tell everyone the news then, I am not sure I could say the right thing at a time like this.’
I thanked the Principal and the Policeman for making the time to tell me privately. I could tell that it was a delicate situation from their perspective, and they had obviously been unsure of how to handle informing me, someone who they had no idea how I might react.
I went back upstairs, the tile stairways slapped with a haunting echo with each step. I felt detached, not really present. I’ve only ever felt that way a few times in my life, the background surrounding me simultaneously in focus but unclear. I robotically made my way back to the classroom, put on a fake smile, and went inside.
Sarah looked at me, I could see she was a bit concerned as well but I gave her a reassuring look.
‘Ok class,’ she said, ‘teacher is back, why don’t we show him what we’ve done so far?’
She’d had the students drawing a picture of the classroom, then labeling the picture with the correct words to practice their spelling. ‘Chairs’, ‘desks’, ‘whiteboard’, etc. I walked by each desk having a look, we’d planned to have the students write their own little stories about their favorite classroom experience following this exercise. Some of the pictures were pretty good, I chuckled to myself, wish I could have had that innate drawing skill.
I passed by the empty seat where Mandy would have been, she always loved drawing class. Sitting ahead of her was Apple, holding up a little drawing of her and a few classmates holding hands in front of their desks.
‘Look at mine!’ She said, pointing to the pictures. ‘When Mandy comes back from her grandparents she can help me finish it.’
I looked at Sarah, she looked back at me. If she were American she might have shrugged in desperation, the look said it all. What else could she say?
I was naked, there was a crowd. What to do?
I told Apple it was an excellent idea, and then started up our next portion of the class. In an instant time was up, the class got ready to leave, and we counted out each student as we did everyday, sending them on to their waiting parents outside.
The count was one short.
I got my bike, called my partner and told him I wouldn’t make it that day, there was an emergency and we’d make it up tomorrow.
I rode, weaving in and out of some light traffic, not sure where to go, thinking about a life that wasn’t meant to be.
