I really gotta stop switching schools every year! When the majority of my teaching load is consistently both Grade 11 (junior) and Grade 12 (senior) students, it presents a conundrum when the year is over and I've moved on to another school. It is easy enough to see the Grade 12s graduate at the current school, but when the Grade 11s graduate the following year, it means a trip back to the former school in order to see that happen.
Obviously there is no rule that says I have to do this, but I take the students' graduation and development very seriously. Regardless of what kind of crap happened at the school in terms of administration, policy changes, and so forth, it's worth putting that aside and making a trip back to attend the graduation ceremony of those former students.
This is now the 2nd year in a row for which exactly that has happened. Last school year (2009-10) I was at a Canadian school in Wuhan and had left it due to a number of reasons. I then came back to see the graduation just this weekend. The year before (2008-09) I was at a school in the outskirts of Shanghai and made a trip back there also. Unfortunately, in both cases, this grad conflicted with other things but I was determined no matter what to attend because I had made a promise that I would do exactly this.
Well it turns out that the weekend grad in Wuhan was emotional to say the least. People knew I was coming, and there were a lot of gifts given, photos taken, stories shared, lots of hugs, and tears shed. It was just like a celebrity moment, but I was more interested in how the students had developed over the last year and which particular universities they were attending in Canada and the US. There were indeed some remarkable achievements and successes on their part, and the trip to Wuhan was worth it -- despite the traffic jam insanity and long distances to/from the school and airport which could only be expected.
Last teaching year put me on the verge of depression. In fact the whole Wuhan experience was one of the most trying in my teaching career, if not my life. There were a few postive experiences in the whole Wuhan saga, but overall it was a constant grinder. Whether it was the mass disorganization, the traffic madness, the pollution, the drabness, the lack of social life, or any other number of factors, I couldn't find a lot of fun in that city. There was also a ton of adventure, to be fair, but the nonstop complaining became a way of life in order to deal with the sheer feeling of being overwhelmed by a sense of powerlessness.
It got to the point when I'd just show up to work, do my thing, and go back to my relative comfort in the Wanke apartment complex to crash on the couch in front of a warm air conditioner. 6pm to bed almost every winter day. There was no desire or motivation to do any lesson planning or paperwork, despite the requirements by the boss. Test papers and lab reports would be weeks behind returning back, and I'd simply find no energy to do anything else. Since it was the 5th year teaching physics in a row, I could do the subject without any notes or plans, and wing the whole thing. Yet there wasn't much originality and it all felt so blah and drab.
Despite all that, it was amazing to see that I did have an impact on students, as evidenced by some of what was seen at the grad ceremony. One student in particular was contemplating suicide, and the situatino was spiralling out of control. Yet his life did begin to turn around towards the end of the year. This process continued where the last year (when I wasn't there) he got very much involved in the student council and leadership boards, and also excelled in his academics. Imagine my surprise when at the grad he told me he was now going to pursue an engineering degree abroad. It was stories like these that made the grad event all worth it, and in retrospect, that entire year.
The year felt like it was meaningless, and in addition, there was oppression and darkness all over the place. Justice was being neglected, human rights were being denied. Fittingly, the sun barely managed to poke through the ever-present haze as a parallel to the spiritual conditions. The question, 'Where is God in all this?' surfaced often in my mind, as the year dragged on. Yet a year later, it seems that question has been answered, as God was there all along.
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