All that you have is your soul (Tracy Chapman).

Monday 24 April 2006

Business As Usual?

I knew that school would start again eventually, I just didn’t think that I would get used to being back so soon (!)

Like the kids, I didn’t feel much like being back. The good news is that my room has been sorted out and the electricity problem has been fixed. The bad news is that my computer was so affected by the too-ing and fro-ing that it decided to pack up and the technician spent most of the day reinstalling Windows.

Added to my woes, I had an observation of sorts and to be honest, I gave a really shit lesson. He knew it, I knew it and so did the kids. I tried to blame the lack of whiteboard and resources, but we both knew that I was bullshitting. In all honesty, he really shouldn’t have been looking at my teaching on the day I return from a two-week holiday, but then again, who said life was fair? It wasn’t an official observation, so it’s ok and he did help to give me ideas when I have to re-teach the same lesson to three different classes in a row, tomorrow morning.

It is exam week and I did some invigilating for Year 10. I can’t think of anything more boring (it’s definitely up there with watching paint dry). I almost hoped that some kid would be caught cheating – anything to enliven the monotony.

On a different note, tonight and tomorrow is Yom Hashoah (Holocaust Memorial Day) in Israel and therefore by extension, a commemoration observed by Jews around the world.

It is a day of reflection and thought, memory and hope and has extra resonance this year, what with the continued anti-Semitic pronouncements and Holocaust denial by Hamanejad in Iran.

Shaul Mofaz, the Israeli Defense Minister stated that a nuclear Iran is the most deadly threat faced by the Jews since Hitler. He’s not wrong. So, let us pray that on this, one of the saddest days in our calendar, we see the demise of this fascist of a man – or at least the beginning of his end.

If he’s still around twelve months from now, we’re all in deep shit.

On a happier note, the days are getting longer and sunshine is starting to permeate through the clouds. It’s the end of one day, but the beginning of the next. You have to be positive, irrespective of everything out there that tries to get you down.

You have to remain positive.

Always.

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