Had a Bad Day

Last Friday night my PC friend Erin called me. She was having a bad day. A professor had scolded her because she didn’t hang out and talk with the other professors. On top of this agitation she should not cry in public, which is where she was—I suggested sunglasses. We talked for about 20 minutes, interrupting conversations to go purchase more credit for our phones. I was worried about Erin. She is a great person and I think she is frequently misunderstood, even by other Americans here. Like me, Erin is also the only female teacher at her school.

Yesterday I called Erin. I was having a bad day. I had given my 5eme classes, or the evil ones, a quiz, or interrogation. They are older than my 6eme kids, and my 6eme kids understand English better than them and this is their first year. My 5eme kids insist I explain things in French. I try to refuse as much as I can. They laugh when they shouldn’t, and even with cultural barriers I can tell they are not even trying at times. I can deal with students who don’t understand, but I am frustrated with those that won’t even try. I had to throw out a bunch of students, but that is not what set me over the edge.

A professor had tried to help, but by helping I was worried he had shown the students I alone could not deal with them. He also called the students stupid. I don’t agree. He also said the students didn’t know any better. I agree to a point, but I also believe my students do know better, or at least capable of knowing better. The professor proceeded to tell me that I was not any different than the other professors in how the students acted. I disagreed. He did not know the countless times I have had to tell students to stop watching my class, only to get stares from the students, who look at me like I am a piece of meat—upholding their male roles in Benin society. He also said I didn’t know students. I disagreed. I had classroom experience prior to coming to Benin, and I knew students a little better than he might think—besides he doesn’t really know me at all. Like Erin, I felt misunderstood.

I wanted to explain things to him, but instead I said thank you and went to give my students a lecture, but I felt tears welling up in my eyes. I was not prepared for that to happen, and so I stopped, said nothing, and just went back into my lesson. I left class twenty minutes early, while the students copied, afraid I could not hold it in, and I put on my sunglasses, fearing someone might see me about to cry.

When I reached home, I allowed myself to fully go through all the thoughts I had suppressed in the classroom. These students, these professors don’t understand the sacrifices I have made to be here and to help them, and some of them don’t care. For them life goes on as normal, with or without me, and for others I am just amusing because I am white and American. I thought, well shit, I could teach kids who waste my time in the United States, and at least I could yell at them more appropriately then I can here. I sat on my bed and I looked at my pictures from home, and I let out, through tears, a little of the home sickness I had been battling with. I wished for a second I could just be my old self, and my old life. In the United States I could tell the men to **ck off, or cut some other insult. Here, I can’t, it isn’t appropriate, nor do I know how to say that in French. And what saddened me more, was that in thinking that, I realized I could never have that old life back. Even when I go home, I will always know there is something that exists outside of my world.