Your average American would describe the Indonesian classroom as unruly. I began my first real day at school being shuttled from class to class, making 3 minute introductions about myself, drawing the United States & Kentucky on the whiteboard, and answering the questions of the few students outgoing enough to ask. It turns out that Indonesian students operate with a group mentality, and very few of them are willing to call attention to theirselves by raising a hand. The question I got asked most was about my hobbies, which include writing and rattling off the names of bands that few, if any, people in this country have ever heard of. You know: Cut Copy, Datarock Datarock, Of Montreal, etc. At least everyone here knows the Beatles. One kid tried to call me out by asking, "Do you like to sing? Will you sing for us?" And then giggling profusely. So I laid the smackdown on him and sang a few lines of Hey Jude. Stunned silence, good or bad I'm not sure. At least they seemed to approve when I told them I wanted to learn to surf while I was here.
The next most asked question pertained to my marital status. It's actually pretty common for strangers to ask if you're married (at least to white people). Of course, replying "single" was met with a round of giggles (especially from the girls in class). In fact, it seems that giggling was the appropriate response for almost any question I answered, even when the answer was pretty tame. At least a few more people in the world know that cornbread exists. Now if only I knew where to find a skillet and some cornmeal...
I think the hardest part of my introductions was keeping my English together. Half of any conversation I got involved in consisted of one conversant talking and asking questions in sometimes-more-sometimes-less broken English. By the end of the rounds, what was coming out of my mouth was a mix of bad English and a few Indonesian words. I'm going to have to keep an ear on that if I hope to teach these kids anything worthwhile.
To give you an idea of the average classroom at my school: Imagine a sparsely decorated room with a few pictures of important imams (Muslim religious leaders) or the current president. Fill that room with around 30 kids sitting at at two person table-desks, then group the boys together and the girls together to the point that you can see a physical gender division, usually with the boys in the back. This is the still shot of the Indonesian classroom. Animate this picture and you will see lots of giggling and whispering in the ears of deskmates (especially among the girls). The boys would make any American teacher cringe; during class one will see playful shoving, light smacking, and other forms of horseplay. On occasion, one boy will jump out of his seat and rush to an empty chair by a fellow (fellow being specifically male) classmate, and every once in a while, some of the more unruly boys will straight up yell something at the teacher. I don't like using the word something in my writing, but since I don't understand Indonesian, something will have to suffice. Not all students fit these descriptions though. At least a third of students sit quietly in their seats, listening and sometimes even taking notes (but they'll still whisper a quick sentence or two to their neighbor, albeit more covertly than some). This isn't to say that these kids are bad. Its just that they didn't grow up in an educational system organized around complete obedience to a teacher. For me, it just means that instead of expecting the children to behave and do immediately as they're told, I'll have to work with them. I'll have to play their games and teach them to play mine. Sometimes I'll have to wait for them to be quiet, and other times I'll have to take a more active role. I'm thinking the "clap once if you can hear me!" *clap* route might work well.
Each English Teaching Assistant is paired with a full-time teacher at the school, called our counterpart; I finally got to meet mine today. He's a slight man in his early thirties who maintains pretty tight control over his classroom (or as tight as an Indonesian classroom can get). His name is Pak Googy. (I'm not sure I mentioned this in any of my previous posts, but Pak means Mr. while Bu means Mrs.) I hadn't met him before today because he has been ill and hence absent from school since I got here. I observed him in class today and was half amused half shocked at the way he introduced himself to the class. He said, "My name is Pak Googy, and please be sure to pronounce the 'y' at the end of my name." All the kids giggled. If you don't get it, Pak Googy has a very gaunt face and almond shaped eyes. Remember that I'm in Asia and many people in my area pronounce g's and k's almost identically. Think WWII. Anyway, his English is pretty excellent and he seems like a pretty cheerful fellow. Plus, he approved of the fact that I tend to roll my own cigarettes. I think we're going to get along swimmingly.
After school was all said and done, I opted to ride around with the school's driver and the Japanese teacher, Pak Bagus, to deliver some Ramadan care packages to a few teachers' houses. Pak Bagus is about the same age as Pak Googy and is very proficient in English. Among other things, we talked about dating in Indonesia. It seems that once people reach my age and graduate from university, they start dating seriously, as in marriage track. So it seems that I won't be dating during my grant period. He also asked about premarital relations, and I had to tell him that American Pie is not representative of America at large. As far as the intimate side of dating is concerned, I told him it depends on where you live, what you believe, how you were raised, and what you're looking for. "Yeah, pretty much the same here in Indonesia," he said, "except the women are more conservative."
I don't know when I'll be writing to you all next. I'm off to Surabaya tomorrow then taking a plane to Jakarta on Friday morning. I can't imagine that an 8 hour car ride will be terribly eventful. I'll keep you all in the loop if anything cool happens though.
