Exam writing has now reached its peak in our school with emails flying from person to person and pen drives being plugged it right left and centre to ensure that the pupils are presented with yet another paper on which they can practice their considerable skills in cheating.
I must admit that I completed my part of the construction of one of the latest papers with something rather less than enthusiasm. God knows if I’d rather watch a mediocre game of football where Chelsea send in the wreckers to limit the flowing football of Barça than compose a shining set of clever and scintillating sentences to stimulate the exam jaded appetites of young scholars in our place then something must be very wrong about the sort of work that I am supposed to be doing.
Or perhaps it was just a day on which I felt jaded and frustrated after having to deal with the natural arrogance of the rich spawn we have to teach all day!
Also the delay in saying anything about my contract is also playing on my mind. The head of English was talking about books for next year and including me in the conversation which does seem suggestive, but nothing has been said and unless there is a contract then nothing is clear. Tomorrow is the last day before our four day holiday which is seen as some sort of watershed in our place. If nothing is said then I will use the holiday to rewrite my CV (which I haven’t done because I still assume that they will present me with a contract in due course!) and, with a suitable letter start addressing the envelopes to all the schools which could possibly use my services.
I keep writing that I should not trust any private school to do the decent thing, but in my heart of hearts I still expect them to do so. If nothing else my time in The School That Sacked Me should have taught me that logical expectations cannot be relied upon in a private system which bears little relationship to the way in which I have been used to experience education!
It is a simple fact that the public system of education, with all its faults and its built in idiocy is more professionally based that any private school of my experience. But the food is much better in private education!
As an unexpected bonus I was able to luxuriate on the balcony in the evening sun today – and yes, I did have a glass of red wine to soothe away the stresses of the day!
In spite of asking the bank to send my new card to the house the bank (the awesomely hateful BBVA) has of course done nothing of the sort. It is now residing in the local branch which (in spite of the obscenely large amounts of money earned by that shameless organization) has now adopted a so-called “summer timetable” which means that the bloody place is only open between the hours of eight and half past two. Thus ensuring that I will not be able to get my card until the summer!
Although I have tried in the past, I feel that the gentle finger taps I make on the keys of my computer are totally inadequate in managing to convey the atavistic, visceral and overwhelming hatred that I feel towards that smug, arrogant and consumer oblivious organization. The only (believe you me it really is the only) reason I stay with them is that they have managed to acquire a substantial number of my euros held as a sort of ‘guarantee’ for the contract that we had to take out on the flat. This piece of financial skullduggery was perpetrated using the excuse of my somewhat ambiguous financial status. I feel like echoing the biblical sentiment, “I was a stranger and you took me in.” I am a little more cynical than I was when I first arrived and there are certain aspects of what was explained was essential that I would now treat with the contempt that they deserve. But there again it is very easy to be wise after the event!
I am already planning the books that I am going to read over the ‘holiday’ – but only if the sun don’t shine!
I must admit that I completed my part of the construction of one of the latest papers with something rather less than enthusiasm. God knows if I’d rather watch a mediocre game of football where Chelsea send in the wreckers to limit the flowing football of Barça than compose a shining set of clever and scintillating sentences to stimulate the exam jaded appetites of young scholars in our place then something must be very wrong about the sort of work that I am supposed to be doing.
Or perhaps it was just a day on which I felt jaded and frustrated after having to deal with the natural arrogance of the rich spawn we have to teach all day!
Also the delay in saying anything about my contract is also playing on my mind. The head of English was talking about books for next year and including me in the conversation which does seem suggestive, but nothing has been said and unless there is a contract then nothing is clear. Tomorrow is the last day before our four day holiday which is seen as some sort of watershed in our place. If nothing is said then I will use the holiday to rewrite my CV (which I haven’t done because I still assume that they will present me with a contract in due course!) and, with a suitable letter start addressing the envelopes to all the schools which could possibly use my services.
I keep writing that I should not trust any private school to do the decent thing, but in my heart of hearts I still expect them to do so. If nothing else my time in The School That Sacked Me should have taught me that logical expectations cannot be relied upon in a private system which bears little relationship to the way in which I have been used to experience education!
It is a simple fact that the public system of education, with all its faults and its built in idiocy is more professionally based that any private school of my experience. But the food is much better in private education!
As an unexpected bonus I was able to luxuriate on the balcony in the evening sun today – and yes, I did have a glass of red wine to soothe away the stresses of the day!
In spite of asking the bank to send my new card to the house the bank (the awesomely hateful BBVA) has of course done nothing of the sort. It is now residing in the local branch which (in spite of the obscenely large amounts of money earned by that shameless organization) has now adopted a so-called “summer timetable” which means that the bloody place is only open between the hours of eight and half past two. Thus ensuring that I will not be able to get my card until the summer!
Although I have tried in the past, I feel that the gentle finger taps I make on the keys of my computer are totally inadequate in managing to convey the atavistic, visceral and overwhelming hatred that I feel towards that smug, arrogant and consumer oblivious organization. The only (believe you me it really is the only) reason I stay with them is that they have managed to acquire a substantial number of my euros held as a sort of ‘guarantee’ for the contract that we had to take out on the flat. This piece of financial skullduggery was perpetrated using the excuse of my somewhat ambiguous financial status. I feel like echoing the biblical sentiment, “I was a stranger and you took me in.” I am a little more cynical than I was when I first arrived and there are certain aspects of what was explained was essential that I would now treat with the contempt that they deserve. But there again it is very easy to be wise after the event!
I am already planning the books that I am going to read over the ‘holiday’ – but only if the sun don’t shine!
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