Why I hate My School

My sister sent me a link to my old school “Pakistan Embassy School Jeddah” or as it is called now “Pakistan International School Jeddah”. Looking through the pictures I decided to write the following piece.
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If I were to believe that there is any level of sensibility or intelligence in me today, and if I were to trace that sensibility back to my forming years, I will end up with the picture of a young, scared, schoolboy standing in front of a mammoth white colored building with black minaret shaped windows covered with slanted sills that intercepted glances both in and outwards. As the years would go by, this schoolboy will become an awkward, under confident teen who believed very less in much anything including himself. This was my school. The first, and for a majority of my learning years, the only place I had known to call by that name. There are so many memories in those hallways, very few of which leave me with a smile on my face.


I am, I suppose, by most definitions what you would consider a modestly successful individual today. And yet I refuse to give credit for any of what little I have achieved to the school I went to or the teachers I met from when I was five years old, through my preteen years, till I finished high school and finally left for Canada when I was seventeen. Am I ungrateful? I know some of my friends from the same school will say I am. I’ve become a Gora! I’ve forgotten where I’ve come from. Well, forgotten, my dear friends, I haven’t. Let me remember.


I am in grade 4 or maybe 5. There are about sixty or seventy kids stuffed in my classroom. Our scheduled class is for Urdu or Islamiat, I can’t remember, and the teacher hasn’t shown up yet. What do you get when you leave that many kids unattended in a classroom? Noise! We weren’t breaking things, climbing off the fans, or beating the crap out of each other. We were simply talking. That many hyper ten year olds and things can get a little loud. About fifteen minutes into the unattended class, in walks a random teacher. I can’t remember who it was anymore, but I think he was the Vice Principal at the time. I don’t remember his name, but I do remember he wore a clean white Shalwar Kameez and had a neatly trimmed beard. He walks in and the whole class goes silent almost instantly. He asks for the class monitor. A chubby kid with a lisp we found funny named Mubarak Ali stands up and walks over to where the teacher is standing next to the teachers’ desk. He asks the rest of us to go and stand at the back of the class and raise our arms in the air. I get a funny feeling in the pit of my stomach. The teacher spends the next fifteen minutes meticulously beating the crap out of Mubarak as if he is a grown man his own age. He slaps him, punches him, kicks him when he falls to the floor, picks him up and throws him about on chairs and desks. We all stand at the back of the class, horrified, not sympathizing with Mubarak but rather hoping that it won’t come to us after he is through with Mubarak. After he has had enough, he leaves Mubarak where he lies and sits on the teachers’ chair. He remains motionless for the rest of the class staring blankly at us with no expression on his face whatsoever. The class bell rings, the next scheduled teacher comes to the class, he leaves, Mubarak crawls back to his chair in the front row, the rest of us retrieve to wherever we were sitting and start taking down notes as the next teacher starts to scribble on the board.


I am in grade 6. Arabic is one of the compulsory subjects in grade 6, 7 and 8. Sir Baaqi, who teaches us Arabic, is one of my favourite teachers. He is quite methodical in his ways. Every day he gives us homework, the next day he takes our copies, checks our work and then returns it the following day. The day we don’t have our copies we have an oral quiz. Today he is returning our work. He always has a gentle smile on his face and has an intelligent sense of humour. He walks in with a pile of copies in his hands reaching up to his nose. He places them on the desk, settles down on the chair, takes off his white namaz cap and places it besides the pile of copies. Most of the copies have some folded pages. He picks up the first copy, reads out the name of the student the copy belongs to, flips open the folded pages, and reads out loud the mistakes on the folded page. The student whose name he just announced starts walking towards the desk. As he reaches out to grab his copy, before he can take it, he extends his arm out. Sir Baaqi takes a wooden ruler he keeps in the drawer and slaps him on his open palm. Each folded page earns one slap. The sound of the wooden ruler hitting the flat open palm resonates in an otherwise silent room. The student then takes his copy and walks back to his chair. Sir Baaqi picks up the next copy and reads out my name. I get a funny feeling in the pit of my stomach.


I am in grade 7 or 8. The school has ended but I am hanging out with two of my classmates in the corridors. They are talking about this other classmate and our English teacher Sir Khush Haal Khan Khatak, who pronounces "that" as "date". I don’t understand what they are saying but there seems to be an underlying sense of adventure, so I tag along. They go into different classrooms and I follow but they are all empty. I ask them who or what they are looking for and they say Chaudhry. I don’t like him. He is this whiny little kid with delicate features. I think he is selfish because he won’t share and let me copy his schoolwork for the days I stay home pretending to be sick. Regardless, I don’t feel like going home yet so I keep following them. Finally we enter this one classroom and we find Chaudhry. Sir Khatak is also there who upon seeing us jumps a little and then hides behind his desk. I get a funny feeling in the pit of my stomach. He is holding on to Chaudhry who now has a scared and embarrassed look on his face. Sir Khatak lets go of Chaudhry and fumbles up a sentence about his good work. There is nothing written on the board and there is no book or copy anywhere. Chaudhry’s schoolbag is lying at the entrance door. Chaudhry quickly walks past us, grabs his schoolbag and runs out. Sir Khatak looks at us angrily and we run out into the corridor too. As I am running behind my two classmates, I hear one of them smirk and exclaim to the other, "Me ne kahaa thaa naa Sir Khatak londay baaz hain!" I don’t want to hang out with them anymore. I lose them and head home.


I am in grade 8. I had been begging a friend of mine to give me his copy of the new Vital Signs cassette. I promise him I will make a copy at home and return it to him the next day. He finally caves in and gives it to me. I have it in my bag and I can’t wait to go home, and listen to it while making a copy in my parents’ Kenwood "deck". The last class of the day is Urdu and I can barely wait for it to be over. The teacher walks in and he has a walkman, a video tape and some firecrackers in his hand. He slaps them on the desk and gives us a lecture about bringing prohibited things on the school premise. He then starts checking our schoolbags randomly. I pray to God he doesn’t check mine. He walks in the isles looking for his next random victim. He is looking at everyone’s face trying to read who’s hiding something. He pounces on this one student’s bag, unzips it and starts fondling the contents. He takes out his half eaten lunch wrapped in foil, smells it jokingly and tosses it back in. Everyone laughs cautiously. He has his arms folded at his back and walks slowly isle to isle finally reaching the one that I am sitting in. I don’t look him in the eye but keep looking straight. He walks past me, then comes back and suddenly pounces on my purple and black JanSport backpack. I get a funny feeling in the pit of my stomach. He opens it up and starts his investigation. I am still hoping he misses the cassette. His hand finally comes out and I am broken to see his short stubby fingers around my friend’s cassette. He gives me a look of disgust and enquiry. I look at him for the first time and say, "Sir! It’s only music!" I quickly add, "Sir it’s the same band that sang Dil Dil Pakistan" trying to legitimize my obviously illegal possession. He pauses for a second, then drops the cassette and crushes it with the heel of his shoe.


There is more; too much to remember, too much to write. There is much more.