Dear Parents

Everything we have in body and mind has come from the care, protection, and teachings of our parents and teachers. -- Venerable Acariya Maha Boowa Nanasampanno

Could it be that by being a teacher I understand my parents better now?

On The Journey Towards Hospitality

FR. LARRY GILLICK, S.J. via HenriNouwen.org

There are two Latin words, which sound almost the same. The first is "hospes," which means “welcome” and the second is "hostis," which means "enemy.” From the first word we have the word, "hospital" and from the second we have "hostage". Welcoming is a free accepting of the other; taking hostages means imprisoning the other.

In our neighborhood, when I was a young lad, I often visited two homes of friends that were on our block, I looked forward to visiting one of them but dreaded visiting the other. Years later when I was revisiting my old neighborhood I recalled that split. When I would go to the first home, the mother of my friend would sit down with me at the breakfast table and listen to my exaggerations and exploits. There would be cereal bowls and empty cups on the table, but she would ignore them, turn off the radio so she could hear me better and seemed to enjoy being a part of my life. She could get me talking about myself and I loved that, even if what I was saying wasn't really quite true!

The second house was not so much fun. When I would visit there I had to be careful. The woman seemed to listen, but she was always cleaning the windows and dusting and keeping me nervous with her broom in hand. She was pleasant enough, but I felt like a germ about to infect her sanitary bubble. I think I felt sorry for her, because she wasn't comfortable in her own house.

If we have welcomed ourselves, others will find welcome in us. If we are a hostage to ourselves, we will be imprisoned by our loneliness.

It infuriates me to be wrong

The first two days of the holy month of Ramadan were quite extraordinary.

As ever, on Friday I was leaving Bukit Mertajam with much difficulty. I admit the place practically always gets me down but as I said before I would never ever leave Alor Star because there are the two most wonderful kids I've ever known, Amelia and Delia.

The first class was great, but the rest was either bad or terrible. I finished the last class at 10:30 and went straight to bed. In the meantime and in the depth of the misery, I scribbled down the following:

It infuriates me when the person who is in charge of Alor Star asks me for some extra work and immediatelly remarks that extra hours for me means extra hours for them as well. True, she would have to spend more time chatting and reading her novels...

It infuriates me when I am willing to give up one of my good classes, so that one teacher could handle two classes of the same level and the overall quality and efficiency of our teaching would improve, only to hear Sylwia categorically insisting on having the two classes.

It infuriates me to be wrong when I know I'm right. -- Moliere

Today was far better. I had so much fun with the youngest kids. Delia had her birthday on 3 October and I gave her a story book about Marco Polo. To me, these children are the greatest explorers of all time and this is what I wrote to her:

Like travelling and exploring,
learning is a great adventure, too.
Marco Polo was one of the greatest travellers of all time,
and by learning you can become just like him.

Today, she brought the book with her and she told me about how much she liked it. Finally, before I left Alor Star, I was invited to an annual ceremony for kids leaving their kindergarten, where Amelia is having some dancing performance. Can't wait for that!

Yet this wasn't the end as the journey back was quite remarkable. The evening light saw me utterly spellbound by the greenery of the paddy fields, flocks of birds high up in the sky (some birds are supposed to be migrating from China now), Gunung Jerai with its peak shrouded in clouds.

In Scotland, where it is almost incessantly just cloudy, I often experienced this interesting thing when the rare strips of sunshine made their way down on the Earth through a crack in a layer of clouds. I was always fascinated by this company on my many rambles and I came to call it a God's window.

Now, a God's window like that opened above its peak just as I was speeding on my bike past Gunung Jerai. I stopped by the roadside, trying to come to terms with the meaning of such a startling beauty.

There's been a thing playing on my mind for a couple of weeks. I've been trying to admit that I'd felt lonely most of my life, but the God's window carried a message. All this way I might not have been alone after all.

First Impressions

Sometimes I feel that I should really apologize to my students: “Yeah, I know, it was so bad today. The beginning was kind of awkward, it just didn’t quite turn out as I thought. Then the poem was too hard and I shouldn’t have ploughed through it for so long. It’s not you... Sorry, I messed it up.”

Then I would go on to think: “Hey, hold on! Whom will it serve? How will it aid their learning? Think it over. You learnt a lesson so try to get something out of it and don’t do the same stupid things again!”

This is particularly true when I get new students. I simply seem to struggle with giving good first impressions.