Perspective and Pep Talks

It's been a remarkable day.

To everyone's surprise, the "temporary" classrooms were in good enough order to permit three class to take progress tests in the morning and a class in the afternoon. It all went very well. The Addams Family, (I feel a bit of a heel calling them that now, I'm becoming quite fond of them), did reasonably well in their progress test - I'll write more about that later when I've looked at the test data more closely. And in the afternoon I took Brokeback Mountain for "study skills", which will actually focus on writing and nut-and-bolts like spelling. It all went so well I did actually wonder if I was dreaming.

As we waited for the minibus to fill up, LM gave me, T3 and TOHH new job descriptions. Well, they were new only in as much as our job titles have been changed from "Project Lead Tutor" to "English Teacher", the rest is the same. The good bit came when TOHH initially refused to take hers from LM because "I'm leaving". I've not got the gen on this yet, but apparently - I gather from a couple of truncated conversations with LM - she's (at least) threatened to resign. T4 is on her way from Turkey (she has been in the recruitment pipeline since August, apparently - put the Company together with Turkish and HUDC bureaucracy and see what happens...) So, if TOHH does indeed go the distance, her classes will be covered and I for one will have a song in my heart.

We got back to The Bungalows to get an induction talk from Johnny, the Company's "go between" as HD described him, but he corrected that to say he was the local manager. Whatever. He was very nervous, and gave information about what not to wear, the local archaelogical society... It was all balls, really. PTI, however was incredibly rude to him, cross examining him in effect and demanding to know why we hadn't been given this information at the start, and why The Company was building a local admin office next door to the bungalows... DoS was there, too, and looked nervous - I was sitting next to him and his hands were shaking when he was talking about the piss poor internet connexion here.

There's been a change of regime in the management of the workmen at the site, with the slightly unhinged pain-in-the-arse "Ahmed" sacked.

If PTI was behaving badly to the point of weirdness, it all got stranger thereafter. LM told me that HD had had a word with him about my demeanour - apparently it's not deferential enough to HD. Ha ha. It'll stay that way, too. What can he do? My actual work is way beyond reproach. We're subject to UK labour law and it would take some doing to base a verbal warning on person's manner when addressing management.

Poor KST has had bad personal news: his wife's from China and is living there at the moment. She's been taken ill and is in hospital, and his Chinese isn't up to getting information about what is actually wrong with her. So he's flying to China as soon as he can sort out a visa. I'll miss him, he's a nice bloke, whose only fault was to form an alliance with TOHH - he's such a nice bloke he would hardly notice she had a few tiles off.

KST2 arrived from the airport in the middle of the meeting, God bless her: what she made of that I can't think.

And what she made of the cherry on the weirdness cake is even less fathomable. I'd gone into the city centre to attend church and run a few unimportant errands, and got a 'phone call from LM, who'd had a phone call from HD, who'd had a phone call from Johnny-Go-Between to say that there was trouble brewing in a flare up of the Danish cartoons continuing sore-point, and we were to stay indoors and not leave The Bungalows. I should therefore return immediately. The city centre was its usual chaotic, happy, carefree self, so I said that I wouldn't - and actually ended up staying longer than intended. There was no trouble. On the way home with our usual taxi driver, who is both devout and has an ear to the ground, I asked him if there was any trouble in town, and he was completely flummoxed by the idea.

So, either Johnny-Go-Between got the wrong end of the stick, or he was sincerely passing on duff information, or there actually was an anti-Danish protest which passed me and the taxi driver by... OR, (and this is the bookies' favourite), it was a load of old toot passed on for unknowable but probably Machiavellian reasons.

When I got back I had a chat over a pipe with LM and KST. LM told me that he questioned the gravity of the situation with HD, who'd said that he had to take his word because "I've been in trouble spots, under fire!" He was an NCO in the RAF - I suspect any fire he took came from his own side, given his breath-taking sense of self importance and utter lack of leadership ability.

Perhaps the writing's on the wall for him. I understand that recruitment makes a significant hole in The Company's budget, and if he loses KST and TOHH in the same week it won't look too good - these blokes get high salaries but they get the drop with ruthlessness if they aren't paying their way.

Weird. I wonder if any wheels are coming off? It's fun to sit back and watch it.

Or maybe the whole day really has been a dream?

This morning we went straight into town to buy stationery. We were joined by the DoS, and a local Mr Fix It, and went on with them to get SIM cards for telephones. I’d already got one a few days ago, but management believes that ones you can buy over the counter are dodgy – the ones we got today needed the production of a passport, a form, and of course, a photo.

Back at the college, we had a pow-wow with HD and DoS. The latter is a small unassuming bloke, but carries some indefinable air of authority and meaning business.

He gave us some background. This college is part of a big picture of modernisation here. Millions of immigrant workers have been lately expelled. Quarter of a million civil servants have been made redundant. The idea now is, to retrain the workforce to deal with the rest of the world.

The current educational system is acknowledged to be woefully inadequate, and has no FE system. Our college will address that, giving training in key skills, business, management, and engineering. Crucially, all of this will be done in English. So our department, whilst fundamental, is not the rationale. In other words, it’s and English-medium FE college, which naturally entails English teaching: it’s NOT a school of English.

Despite the cynicism which is the stock in trade of an experienced EFL teacher, I felt rather buoyed up by my role in giving this place a leg-up to the 21^st century.

Then we got down to the nitty-gritty. Our lack of internet connexion at the accommodation is being addressed as a matter of urgency.

The current site manager, I’ll call him Ahmed, is on his way out. He’s worked in England for several years, he says, and indeed has good idiomatic control of the language. But he’s full of shit. He keeps on about the internet connexion, and how he chases the people responsible – whereas we’ve learned it’s nothing to do with him.

The security situation has also been lamentable. Somebody locks the gate in the early evening, and then goes off to one of the apartments to sleep until nearly eight the next morning. No amount of shouting will wake him. Two nights running, T2 and KST have gone out for a stroll and been unable to get back in through the gate – KST climbed in through a gap in the fence.

We’re to get either a van or a car, and the services of a driver. I asked about driving it ourselves, and the legal situation is to be looked in to.

The site’s “guard dog” has its days numbered. It’s actually just a stray who Ahmed’s befriended, and that would be ok if the bastard didn’t bark nonstop all night. LM was assured that he’d go to some friends of Ahmed’s “who have a nice big farm”. Yeah, right. Ahmed should seek some work there too.

Tellies and more furniture are subject to some kind of budget review in the UK. I said nowt, but I can live without the box for now.

LM had wondered whether it was ok for me to start a wee garden at the back of our house. I was assured today that I should go ahead. This has cheered me immensely.

After the meeting there was a bit of frantic activity to make sure we were ready to actually do some English-teaching related stuff tomorrow – placement tests – at last. It’ll be good to get them done, and then get some structure into the day when we start teaching next week.

When we got back a grim, silent, fat, mirror-glasses wearing African was introduced by Ahmed as Sinousi. He’s to do with the Internet. Maybe he looked so grim because Ahmed was getting on his nerves. Anyhow, still no internet tonight. There are guards on the gate though. And no sound of a dog barking.