A
Tour of Duty
By
Dominic Horton
My
dear son Kenteke is growing up and getting older and he will be off
to big school come September, so I visited a high school open day
this week to have a mooch around. Kids don't just go to the closest
school to their abode these days, oh no, like everything else schools
have to sell themselves, have to compete for the affections of choosy
parents. Nothing is simple in the world anymore, everything is up for
sale and vying for our attention; energy companies, telephone
providers, even water suppliers. Water being sold off was the most
evil aspect of the privatisation drive and people making profits out
of providing such a fundamental and essential human necessity is
quite obscene. Mind you, returning to education, the high school that
I attended was a poor excuse of a seat of learning and spat me out
ill equipped to deal with the world of work, further education and
life in general. Thankfully Kenteke's high school will be a great
deal more accomplished than the one I went to.
 |
| A Nasa Microwave oven. |
The
school gaffer greeted us with an introductory speech but he does not
command the title Headmaster or Head as he referred to himself as the
Principal, which is another example of an unwanted Americanism that
has infiltrated our institutions. The Principal was not a Yankee
though as he had an ever so feint Geordie accent and I
wondered if he had worked on ridding himself of his regional dialect
as a move to further his career. Not that I am a cynic, as regular
readers of this column will know. The genial Principal was a
slightly pudgy man with a sober grey suit, a trimmed beard
(which makes up for a lack of hair on his head) and black,
polished Dr Marten shoes on his feet, all of which lead to him
emitting a kindly and welcoming countenance. I thought to myself that
in order to rise to such a lofty position he might have a streak of
b*stard in him and there was an intimation of this when he cracked a
joke about the teachers and they all laugh dutifully and nervously in
union. The Principal has the same name as a greasy haired chronic
drunk I used to play darts with, who couldn't even pick up a dart
until he had sunk a few drinks but once he had steadied his nerves
was an ace marksman. I doubt whether the head of the school needs
to drink a heart starter to get him going in the morning and even if
he needed one the Principal wouldn't do it on principle.
As
our group of parents started the tour the first thing I noticed was
that there were TVs everywhere (televisions that is, not
transvestites) so the fashion of having flat screen tellies on walls,
invading an otherwise peaceful walk up a corridor, has even spread to
our schools. Other than people like me getting irritated by such
televisions no one else seems to pay much notice too them, especially
as the sound is usually turned down, so they are expensive and
environmentally unfriendly follies, on account of the electricity
they burn and the materials that are used to make them. Thank the
Tooth Fairy that the Pirate has not had a few installed in the Flagon
& Gorses to keep up with Jones's, or more accurately the
Wetherspoons.
 |
| Bill Shakespeare, looking like a cross between the Pirate and Dick the Hook in this daub. |
We
were guided on the tour by a teacher from the school and she was
accompanied by what used to be known in old money as a prefect but a
badge on the girl's jumper told us that she is a gold pupil. I am
glad that I didn't have to wear such a badge when I was at school as
it would have been a little bit embarrassing wearing a badge
labelling me as a “rusty iron pupil”.
Last
week a driver drove his car across mine to get into the school,
cutting me up in the process and it is not that he did not see me it
was more a case of his testosterone pushing him to nip daringly
but dangerously in front of me. Although I had never seen
the driver before I thought to myself at the time that I bet he is a
PE teacher and as the tour took us into the school gym I could see
that for once in my life I was right as the errant driver was
conducting a basketball session, all full of his masculine self with
his all powerful whistle.
Fortuitously the
tour guide quickly called full time on the gym and we moved on to the
science lab and the evocative smell of Bunsen burner gas.
The young teacher was larking about with chemicals and he effected a
semi-spectacular explosion, which I would like to think was not
staged managed for the benefit of the parents. But in the week when
OFSTED warned that low level persistent disruptive behaviour by
school children is seriously effecting learning I noticed that none
of the kids I had seen had been practicing what is commonly
known as f*cking about. Whether this was due to our
parental presence I do not know but the school did seem to
run a tight ship.
 |
| Thomas Hardy, by request of Toby In -Tents. |
I
noticed a detailed diagram on the wall of the science classroom which
was entitled “the journey of a cheese sandwich” and
it demonstrated the complicated journey of the food stuff
from consumption to sewer. To prepare the kids for later life they
should have an accompanying poster headed, “The journey of a
Rhareli Peking Chinese takeaway” which would have an altogether
simpler path: “Cooked in Mr Pings' NASA strength microwave at the
Peking in 40 seconds flat – transported back to home on unsteady
legs – greedily but unsatisfyingly consumed, spilling 25%
down dressing gown – immediately deposited down the karsi.”
On
the way to the English literature classroom I noticed on the dining
hall menu that they have fallen in line with the fashionable
extortion tactic of charging 20p for a sachet of ketchup, and I
thought to myself that they have got some sauce. I wouldn't mind but
you usually only get a thimble full of sauce in these sachets and
most of it is used up on the dip of a single chip. If Kenteke ends up
going to the school I will send him armed with a bottle of ketchup
and he can sell handsome dollops of it at 10p a pop as a nice little
earner. I gather that's how Alan Sugar started out.
On
arrival at the English literature classroom I was disappointed to see
that schools are still stoically plodding on teaching the crusty old
works of Shakespeare. The people in the know about these things
assure us that old Shakey's plays are quite brilliant but I
have to take their word for it as I didn't understand any of them
when I was at school, they were as baffling to me as the
undecipherable algebra. When I arrived at high school the English
teacher took an immediate dislike to me thinking I was going to be a
tearaway like my older brother, the Albino, but at that time it was
not the case. Her ill treatment of me eventually lead to a self
fulfilling prophecy and I rebelled against the old hag
and her teachings.
Her
pride and joy was a leather bound collection of the complete works of
Shakespeare which she kept in a locked glass cabinet. One day when
the class room was empty she foolishly left the key in the cabinet so
we quickly half inched them and threw them in a skip on the way home,
a move that Shakespeare himself might have approved of given that it
contained both comedy and tragedy. A steward's inquiry into
the theft ensued but the crime was perfectly executed so there
was no comedy of errors, the teacher replaced the books so it was
much ado about nothing.
Predictably
I failed my English literature exam but I did win a competition to
see who could pinch the most copies of Thomas Hardy's The
Mayor of Casterbridge, lifting seventeen copies of the book.
The novel was the key text of the course but I didn't get past the
first chapter at school, which explains my failure. On an idle day
months later after leaving school I came across the books in a
plastic bag in my wardrobe and I picked a copy up and started to read
it and I thoroughly enjoyed the book. If only I had bothered to read
the book at school, I thought, I might have passed the exam. Despite
my best endeavours I have not grown out of doing such imprudent
things in my life, in fact I have becoming very adept at such
foolishness. The book did at least begin my love of literature, which
is something that I didn't develop at school. If I had not read The
Mayor of Casterbridge I may not have started to write this
column, so at least something good, or at least average, came out of
it.
Overall
the prospective school was very impressive and streets ahead of the
place where I suffered my high school education. Whatever school
Kenteke goes to I hope that it adequately teaches him Shakespeare and
algebra amongst other things and prepares him for the next step of
his life after school, so unlike his father he doesn't end up living
the lowlife.
©
Dominic Horton, September 2014.
*
EMAIL: lordhofr@gmail.com.
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