Mr. Pill

Six months ago, I never would have believed it to be me to say this aloud:

“I am an English teacher.”

I spend my weekdays with children, teaching them phonics and grammar and reading and writing, how to converse, what to say when they hear this or that phrase. I plan lessons and write notes to parents, play games in the classroom, and decide what books we read together (Dr. Seuss’ Cat in the Hat is my personal favorite and is surprisingly engrossing for five year old Chinese kids, the common inquiry revolves around why that cat with the hat is taller than the humans).

I initially told my students to call me “Mr. Phil,” though many cannot say their ‘Ph/F-‘ sound, so I’ve quickly had to learn to also answer to “Mr. Pill.” As many times as I pull the ol’ “repeat after me,” something about the beginning sound of my name gives certain kids infinite troubles. Naturally, the students that can successfully say “Mr. Phil” think it is hilarious when other students mispronounce my name, so they then proceed to join in with intentional mispronunciations: “Mr. Pill! Mr. Pill! Mr. Pill!”

Now, on any given moment, I reliably and enthusiastically glance up upon hearing any use of the word “pill,” even when I’m not teaching. 

Through eighteen years of public school and university, most of my own teachers have emphatically, resolutely professed that they as teachers learn more from their students than they could ever teach them. From a student’s perspective— the perspective I necessarily held until my current stint in Hong Kong— this was heeded merely as a cliche platitude teachers were expected to say, as common as presumed “I’m good, how are you?” that people lazily respond with following attempted conversation. As I finish my first month as an unseasoned yet earnest rookie teacher, I can’t help but continue the cliche: I have learned more from my students than I could ever hope to bestow upon them— I am thankful to even be part of this lopsided transaction.

I board the metro train early each morning and, without exception, children are boarding alongside on their way to a public school, English class, or extracurriculars. When I board the metro late in the evening, I often chance upon the very same students again boarding alongside me, finishing their day at the same time as the flocks of full-time adult employees. If adults and children were indistinguishable in height or wrinkles, the adults would be made obvious by their impartial countenance and a disinclination to make eye contact, disguised by a feigned preoccupation that makes them impervious to smiling or talking. Children, comparatively, are marked with genuine, unfiltered human emotion, often ricocheting between a gay exuberance or teary-eyed tantrum. I am grateful to spend my days with the latter, notwithstanding volatile temperaments.

Language is a coveted commodity in Hong Kong, relentlessly and vicariously pursued by parents through their children. Every student knows Cantonese and every student learns English both in school and by enrolling in an additional English school — a place like where I teach. The kids in my classes have strenuous, lengthy academic days and are placed under suffocating pressure from both their culture and parents. The students have Chinese and English classes, usually play an instrument and a sport and learn a third-sometimes-fourth language all while somehow finding time to study at home during fleeting intervals in between.

The uphill strain placed on even the very youngest of children — I have classes with three year old’s — is considered a necessary and mandatory trade-off by parents. Its as if alleviating the intensity threatens the success of a student, possibly creating too great a knowledge gap between a student and his classmates. The sleepy, heavy eyes common in students makes me wonder of the health detriments they pay for in exchange for a thorough education (I had one student who actually fell asleep while standing up in one of my classes).

Based upon my own first impressions, I disagree with the intensity and academic burden placed on kids and the deficiencies that are highlighted if one fails to join in with their peers. For a three year old, I don’t know if reciting vocabulary should hold priority over playing outdoors. Stress should be saved exclusively for those old enough to know what the word means. 

Many of the younger children I teach simply show up to class and cry.

And cry.

…And cry.

But who can blame them? For a three year old, they do not understand why their parents left them in a strange room with a foreigner speaking in unfamiliar words and sounds, writing strange symbols on a whiteboard all while expecting a happy, compliant participation. Instead of thinking about how they agree with their parents on how beneficial learning a new language can be, their immediate thoughts might stumble along like this:

Where is mommy? Why can’t I understand what this bumbling, tall human is saying? Why do they want me to sit down at a table?

Don’t they realize I’m only three years old? And very shortly before three I was just turning two?

I’m hungry — can I eat this Crayon?

Putting children— children that were just the week before considered “babies” —into academics with additional language classes (on top of any of the other colorful extracurriculars) easily exceeds my personal understanding of “tough love,” and begins to seep into the “despairingly farcical.”

And yet, despite the first impression I’ve recounted, these kids show up to my class as if their sole reason is to prove just how much I still have to learn. Outside of the sporadic bouts of tears, my students arrive floating along with light, short strides and wearing miniature smiles in between dimpled cheeks. While students are hurried into class by nearby adults, their arrival is denoted by a characteristic falsetto; mischievous, small giggles bounce off light fixtures and the animated commotion makes even the previous moments’ silence seem like a distant memory. Though the students have just as long a “work day” as us teachers, they seem to show up with energy to achieve the spectacular — if I’m feeling sleepy myself, the students bring more than enough exuberance to reinvigorate my own enthusiasm.

When asked the question, “How old are you?” one of my five year old’s would repeatedly answer with so much confidence: “I’m an five.” It was wholly adorable and guileless, an innocent mispronunciation in a foreign language. Now, a handful of lessons later, he is fluently saying, “I am five years old” and further adding, “and how old are you?” —when he says this, his small and plump features beam with a pride that directly reflects the happiness that I feel in his accomplishment.

In just a few short weeks I’ve witnessed many small victories such as this; each time a student learns a new word or how to read a passage or achieves a deeper comprehension of something, it is as if they personally hand over a gift intended just for me. The workdays are long and peppered with discernible stressors and my commute teems with a chaotic din; yet I have no choice but to reiterate another teaching cliche: my kids make the job worthwhile.

Calling this “rewarding” only scratches the outermost surface.