An Old, New Phone. An Old, New School.

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I need a phone!

I arrive at the mall at 10 AM sharp to have my cell phone unlocked and practically shove it down the guy's throat, I'm so desperate for a phone. He tells me to come back in an hour. So I wander around the mall and buy some shampoo for curly hair and a straightening iron. (Hey, I'm a woman! I love wonderous variety!)

I return impatiently to the cell phone stand, and the guy hooks up my phone to some computer and types in some codes or something. Ten minutes pass, and I can see something is going wrong, as the guy looks confused and keeps trying different things. It doesn't work. Baffled, he says, "I don't know why it's not unlocking."

He calls another guy over, and they turn my phone over and around like they've never seen anything like it. I say feebly, almost apologetically, "It's an American phone."

They immediately hand it back to me. They can't unlock it. So, I'll have to buy a European phone. They talk me into buying a used phone from them for 20 pounds.

Further down the mall, I find a store that sells phones, contracts for different companies, and SIM cards. I buy a Lebara SIM card for 20 pounds. This is now the 2nd phone number I've had since arriving here. As I walk back to the B&B, I think of all the people I'll have to contact about my phone number change. It'd be better to email it to everyone, because then I won't have to use up my minutes. But to get online, I have to walk 15 minutes to the internet cafe and pay for a certain amount of time. It's such a hassle.

When I reach my room, I call Dave, the B&B owner. "Hi, Dave, it's Alicia. I need to pay a visit to my school, and I wondered if you know which bus I should take to get to Emerald Road."

"Emerald Road...hmmm," he thought. "Well, tell you what. Meet me in the Matalan's car park. I'll drive you." ("Car park" is British for "parking lot.")

The New School

Dave tells me that the name of the school was recently changed, partly because the place had such a bad reputation. That would explain why no one has heard of it and why it wasn't in the phone book. The school looks run-down, like the rest of Luton. It is obviously an old building and extremely underfunded. Dave drops me off after I assure him that I can take a bus back to the B&B. He doesn't leave until he explains 3 times where the nearest bus stop is and that I need to take the number 7.

A receptionist gives me a quick tour of the school. I meet the young Indian teacher who has been...handling my classes. (Note that I didn't say "teaching my classes". She has been "handling" them and trying to survive in the process.) The kids are WILD! The receptionist leads me through a couple of loud classrooms, introducing me to people whose names I can't remember now. Eventually, she introduces me to Manir, the head of the science department. I find out that I'll be teaching two Year 7 classes, one Year 8 class, two Year 9 classes, and one Year 11 class. Stunned, I ask, "Do you ever have one teacher teach only Year 7 science?" (Year 7 is 6th Grade in the States, by the way.)

Manir looks like that is the strangest thing ever. "I've never heard of a school doing that," he laughs. "That'd be really boring! Then you'd teach the same lesson five times a day!"

I feel defensive, "That's how every school does it back home. That way, you have someone who specializes in Year 7 science."

"Yeah, but then you don't have experience teaching any other Year."

"So?"

"So if you want to get another job, you'll be stuck in Year 7 forever. No one will hire you for anything other than Year 7 science, because that's all you have experience in."

"That's not true," I respond. "People switch Years all the time back home. If we're qualified to teach that age level and subject area, and the principal believes we'll be good for the job, then we can be hired for whatever we want."

Silly Brits.

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