I once picked up a four year old Daniel from primary school
in Rhodes, Greece to find he had a huge red mark on his face where the teacher
had smacked him. This smack had been
administered during the break a good hour before. I was angry and tried with my limited Greek
to complain. The teacher sailed past me
into the staffroom, ignoring my requests for information about what happened. The rest of the parents gathered round and
told me what had happened, gleaned from their kids.
Apparently, the class had been let out to play in the school
yard unsupervised and became too noisy.
This teacher had left her own class and gone out and smacked the first
child she encountered, this happened to be my son. The parents told me this teacher was
notorious for smacking children and complaining would just make things worse
for Daniel. I tried to sleep on it and
cool down but tossed restless with the injustice of it. If only I could speak this wretched language
at least I could defend my son in some way.
But my Greek was limited, very limited.
The next day I went to the staffroom and asked to speak to
the teacher responsible. She came out
into the corridor as regal and proud as ever and in Greek asked me what I
wanted and told me to be quick. I tried
to tell her but the words would not come smoothly and she grew impatient and
went to sail past me as before.
Infuriated I stepped in front of her and prepared to give her a head
butt if she so much as tried to push past me again. Eyeball to eyeball we glared at each other
and she suddenly started saying how sorry she was and how it would never happen
again. She came over the next day at
school assembly and apologised to Daniel in person in front of the other
parents. Who were all bewildered at the
change and wondered who I knew in the educational system to make such a
turnabout. But I had discovered the
universal language of head butting cuts across all cultural boundaries.
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