Present Tense<\/p>\n
By Dewi Anggraeni<\/p>\n
I put the phone down distractedly, drifting into semi
\nconsciousness, dulling the pain. I feel somehow detached from my
\nbody. I know I can't get to the class until it passes, so I just
\nwait in helplessness.<\/p>\n
\"It is a very interesting story, but...\". Wasn't it what they
\nall said? Not quite. The one before that wrote back and said
\nmaybe I should try a publisher in Southeast Asia, since most of
\nthe characters in the story were Asians let them read it. If the
\nstory is about Europeans, let the Europeans read it. How
\nparochial can one be?<\/p>\n
The room is full and I wonder why so many people would want to
\ncram themselves into this tiny place when it is so beautiful
\noutside.<\/p>\n
Doha, my Lebanese student, pushes in, stomach first, and
\nclaims the seat next to my bag. She always sits there, close to
\nwhere I usually stand, ostensibly to be able to rush out if she
\nfeels sick.<\/p>\n
I feel untypically closed in. Trying to surround myself with a
\nbuffer-zone of 'concentration on my present job', I feel as tense
\nas a guitar string. Willing myself to take the roll, I look
\naround and check the attendance. I tick seventeen names, but when
\nI count heads there are eighteen. Once again I count the names
\nthat I ticked. Seventeen. I look around. Eighteen. Am I going
\ncrazy?<\/p>\n
\"How many of you are there?\" I ask, exasperated.<\/p>\n
Everyone starts to count heads. Eighteen.<\/p>\n
\"Then how come,\" I point to my roll-book, \"I only ticked
\nseventeen names on this roll?\" God! Do I have to call all the
\nnames out loud and let them rise one by one? What with two preg
\nnant women and four on workers' compensation for bad backs?<\/p>\n
\"Excuse me, teacher,\" Mara calls. Teacher, teacher! How many
\ntimes do I have to tell them to call me by name?<\/p>\n
\"Teacher,\" she repeats, just to irk me further, it seems,
\n\"This my sista-Alo. She home alone, do nothing. Is orright she
\nhere?\"<\/p>\n
\"Yes, okay,\" I say, relieved to know there is somebody else,
\nthat I am not going mad. \"But please do not tell anyone about it.
\nMrs Moran will not be very pleased. Only people who are on this
\nroll are allowed in this class\".<\/p>\n
I pick up the white board wiper and groan at the ink it leaves
\non my hand. Reaching into my bag to get a tissue, I catch my foot
\non the cord of my cassette-recorder and pull it off the table.
\nDoha, becoming alert from imminent motherhood, grabs it and saves
\nit from reaching the floor. I thank her profusely and reconnect
\nit, then wipe my forehead, out of nervousness.<\/p>\n
When I turn to the group again, they all laugh. I look at
\nthem, bewildered. What now?<\/p>\n
\"Madame\", says Doha, \"now you must wash your face\".<\/p>\n
In the washroom I recover a little. Nothing like cold water to
\nbring you back to sobriety. I shouldn't have rung up before going
\nto a class.<\/p>\n
I return to the room, full of determination. Yoong, my oldest
\nstudent, who's just arrived, is asking another Chinese speaking
\nstudent, why I'm not there.<\/p>\n
\"Here I am!\" I say cheerfully, knowing for sure she doesn't
\nunderstand a single word. Yoong doesn't function in oral or aural
\nEnglish. Everything has to be written down. When this class
\nstarted several weeks ago, she'd drive me insane by interrupting
\nme and the other students, by saying, the only word she was able
\nto say, it seems, \"Write, write, write!\" indicating with her pen
\nto the board. Nobody was able to emit a second syllable in this
\nclass without Yoong saying, \"write, write, write!\" until I
\nfinally put my foot down and said, \"No. No writing please.
\nListen\". I pointed to my ears, then to hers. Fortunately for me,
\nthere are three other Chinese speakers in the group who sometimes
\nhelp me explain to her.<\/p>\n
Yoong looks expectantly at me. I remember then, that she asked
\nher son to ring the night after the previous class, that she had
\nleft a container of Chinese medicine on the table. My husband
\ntook the call, and told me that the son had apparently rung the
\nsecretary of the school as well.<\/p>\n
Being used to communicating with her, I begin to point at her
\nbag then join my hands together to simulate a container, asking,
\n\"Did you get your medicine?\"<\/p>\n
The response was immediate. \"Yeah, yeah, yeah! Thank you,
\nthank you!\"<\/p>\n
So I smile happily and tick her name on the roll.<\/p>\n
Yoong chatters away as one of the Chinese speakers and turns
\nto me, \"Yeah, yeah, yeah! Good teacher, good teacher!\"<\/p>\n
Calm down, lady. I didn't find it. The secretary must have
\ndone.<\/p>\n
\"What are you doing?\" asks a woman on the cassette-recorder,
\n\"I'm playing football\", answers a man. Silly question indeed. The
\nwoman must be blind if she can't see someone playing football.
\n\"Do you play football often?\" asks the woman again. \"Yes, I do. I
\nplay football whenever I can\". Must be a grand final candidate.<\/p>\n
\"What is Lisa doing?\"<\/p>\n
\"She's writing a letter to her grandparents\".<\/p>\n
\"Does she write to...\"<\/p>\n
I can't stand this. This book was published, has been read by
\nteachers and students of English as a Second Language all over
\nthe English speaking world and elsewhere. And what boring stuff
\nit contains! In the meantime, my book, about a woman's battle to
\nregain self-confidence in a world of apathetic people, has been
\nrejected by eleven publishers, or was it twelve?<\/p>\n
I turn off the cassette-recorder with a bit more gusto than
\ncalled for. After some investigative questions to the students, I
\ndiscover that five out of nineteen understand the difference
\nbetween the first and second questions, while the rest can't see
\nit for nuts.<\/p>\n
The next half hour is laborious and tortuously exhausting.
\nWhat idiot invented the difference between Present Simple and
\nPresent Continuous tenses in the English language? Why
\nincorporate it in the tenses when it can easily be clarified by a
\nsimple adverb? Unbelievable.<\/p>\n
Poor Doha. What's the matter with her? The baby must be moving
\ntoo much, putting too much pressure on her back. She jumps each
\ntime somebody gives the wrong response to her partner's question.
\nYoong is becoming very irritated with her. Yoong never likes
\nbeing told she is wrong. Whenever I correct her, she looks around
\nand tries to catch the other Chinese speakers' eyes, then
\nchatters busily to explain that I haven't made it clear to her
\nthat she had to say it in this way and that, much to the embar
\nrassment of her friends. Now she looks sharply at Doha and tells
\nher friends how she feels about this rude woman.<\/p>\n
To prevent this from continuing, I stop the activity and give
\nthem some written work. Yoong begins writing happily, as if
\nsomebody had thrown her a security blanket. She is good at writ
\nten work.<\/p>\n
I find myself using simpler and simpler sentences. I hate
\ngetting wrong answers, especially today.<\/p>\n
The women finish their work at different times and invariably
\nthrust their exercise books at me, though I keep refusing to see
\nthem until everyone has completed the work.<\/p>\n
The time finally comes and I feel my neck tensing up antici
\npating poor results. Doha moves restlessly in her chair and asks
\nif she can start. My attempts at self control only make me feel
\nridiculously happy at the correct answers to make up the re
\nstrained disappointment at the incorrect ones. I become intensely
\ninvolved in the lesson. I must make them understand the differ
\nence between Present Simple and Present Continuous before the end
\nof this session.<\/p>\n
Doha becomes unbearably bossy. Now everyone is annoyed. Who
\ndoes she think she is, their eyes say accusingly. I ignore all
\nthis, doggedly sticking to my task. I can't afford to be bogged
\ndown by trivial rivalry. So I sit down. I stand up. I gesture
\nwith my arms, my head, my legs. My whole body comes alive. I
\ndance about.<\/p>\n
Suddenly Doha reaches out to me. Her hand feels cold and moist
\non my arm. \"Madame\", she pleads, \"Madame, doucement s'il vous
\nplait! Take it easy!\"<\/p>\n
The room, the women, the table and chairs, could snap with a
\n'zingngngng...' when I suddenly collapse into my chair and laugh
\ndespairingly.<\/p>\n
I am just zipping up my bag and looking around when I realize
\nthat Yoong is still standing there, as if waiting for something.<\/p>\n
I look inquiringly. She returns the look.<\/p>\n
\"What's the matter, Yoong?\" I finally ask, too tired to launch
\ninto body language.<\/p>\n
She made a gesture of bad back. \"My son,\" she says, patting
\nher arching back.<\/p>\n
\"What happened to your son?\" I ask, slightly shocked.<\/p>\n
She repeats the performance, then adds, \"Medicine, medicine!
\nThank you, thank you!\"<\/p>\n
\"That's all right,\" I say, relieved. \"I hope he gets better.
\nBye!\"<\/p>\n
Yoong grabs my arm as I am leaving the room, \"Teacher,
\nteacher! Medicine, medicine!\"<\/p>\n
Oh God. I look at her, incredulous, not at our previous
\nmisunderstanding, but at the fact that I still have to cope with
\nthe subsequent problem. Is there no rest?<\/p>\n
\"You didn't get the medicine?\"<\/p>\n
She makes a gesture of telephoning, pointing at me, nodding
\nher head copiously.<\/p>\n
Exasperated, I just look around, then walk around the room,
\nlooking on top of the mantelpiece, under the tables, the chairs,
\nin the corners, and, inanely, inside my own bag.<\/p>\n
\"No,\" I say with a sad face, \"Not there!\"<\/p>\n
Yoong becomes agitated. She repeats the telephoning gesture
\nand pointing at me with added emphasis. Out of sheer helplessness
\nI take her to the empty office and look in every cupboard and
\ncabinet that is not locked, to show her it is not there either.<\/p>\n
If I had a magic wand I'd make her disappear from my sight.
\nShe clings on to my arm, making accusing noises. I walk out of
\nthe place, desperately looking for someone to help me take her
\noff my arm.<\/p>\n
May Lee, the young Taiwanese student, is still standing
\nwaiting for her husband or boyfriend. I call out to her. She
\nturns and walks toward us with a puzzled look. Before I have time
\nto open my mouth, a string of Chinese words pour out of Yoong,
\nwith angry, accusing gestures addressed to me.<\/p>\n
Once in the car, I start to laugh uncontrollably. Yoong is
\ngesturing angrily toward me. I start the car.<\/p>\n
Dewi Anggraeni was born in Jakarta and now lives in Melbourne.
\nA former correspondent of the defunct Tempo weekly, she writes
\nfor The Jakarta Post, Forum Keadilan, and several other
\npublications in Indonesia and Australia. She has three books
\npublished in Australia: two novels, The Root of All Evil (1987)
\nand Parallel Forces (1988), and the third, a trilogy of novellas,
\nStories of Indian Pacific (1993).<\/p>",
"url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/present-tense-1447899208",
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