First Day Of High School
It’s the first day of school and I am nervous. I don’t know a single person, I don’t know the first thing about American high schools and my command of the language can be described, at best, as iffy.
I walk into the first class of the day, English Literature, and don’t dare to look up. I’m afraid someone will ask me something and I won’t understand, or they’ll make fun of what I’m wearing or some other horrible fate that is bound to befall me. I keep my head down, go to the farthest corner of the room and sit in a chair, staring down at my desk.
The teacher walks in and immediately launches into a series of stories about her summer adventures. She’s short and round with a bob of thinning blondish hair that sticks to her forehead. But she has a raspy, contagious laugh that makes her quite endearing.
As she talks, I begin to relax. I can understand most of what she says. At least I can get the gist of the topics she’s discussing. As she continues to talk and jump from topic to topic, she takes out a paper full of typed print and waves it in front of the class.
“This is the list of the required reading for this class,” she says. “By the time this class is over, I expect you to have read every book on this list and then some. We’ll talk about the ‘and then some’ later.” As she’s talking and looking around the room we make eye contact and she stops mid sentence.
Oh no, why did I make eye contact? I quickly look down at my desk and assume the statue pose. What was I thinking? She’s going to say something about me. Worse yet, she’s going to ask me something and I will have to answer it and everyone is going to make fun of my accent. Oh no, what if she asks me what my name is? Please don’t ask me my name or try to pronounce it.
As I sit there quietly praying and trying to melt away into the furniture she says, “Before I forget, we have 2 new students this year. One is, um, um,…” She digs into one of the drawers in her desk and pulls out a piece of paper and studies it.
“Well, one is Michael Davis,” she turns away from me looking for this Michael character.
Thank goodness. There is another new student. Maybe we can be kindred spirits. I look around with everyone else and see a dark haired, skinny boy raise his and wave it through the air. “I’m here,” he says.
“There you are. Welcome to our class Michael. Everyone, please welcome Michael,” the teacher says looking around.
“Welcome Michael,” the entire class repeats back.
“And now we have…, dear me, I’m not sure how to pronounce your name dear,” and before I can offer my name she starts to try to pronounce it, “Neeeyaasun? Is that right.”
“It’s Nayssan,” I say.
“Nissan like the car, dear?” As expected, all the students start to laugh. The teacher though, furrows her brows seriously wondering whether my mom named me after a car.
“No, it’s not Nissan like the car, it’s NAAAYSAN.”
“NEEEESAN,” she repeats.
“No, it’s NAAAYSAN.”
“I obviously need to practice your name. Welcome to our school NEEESAN and you can have the honor of posting this class reading list to the wall, since you’re already in the back there. Come on up and take it please NEEESAN.”
I’m too distracted by her repeated mispronunciations of my name to follow what she asked. I just sit there looking down at the desk.
“NEESAN did you hear me? Please post this.”
Suddenly, I look up alarmed. Post it?
My only experience with the word “post” is when you mail something. I am unfamiliar with any other meaning for the word. But that doesn’t make sense. She wants me to mail the reading list? To whom? Where is the mailbox? And why am I mailing the reading list? Am I supposed to mail it to each student?
“Post it?” I ask tentatively.
“Yes, to the wall please.”
Oh my God, she wants me to mail a letter to the wall! How do I do that?
OK, I tell myself. Relax, breath and think. Obviously, the first thing you need to mail something is an envelope. So I’ll start from there.
“Do you have an envelope?” I ask. I hear a few people start to laugh again.
“An envelope? Why in the world do you need an envelope?” the teacher asks.
“To post the list,” I offer reasonably.
“You want to post it in an envelope? What good would that do? Nobody would be able to read it. No, just post this one sheet of paper.”
Well, I think to myself, I’ve never mailed anything in the U.S. so maybe they don’t use envelopes here. Maybe they have a new system of figuring out where each piece of paper is supposed to go. We’ve been told all our lives how advanced and exceptional everything is in America. This must be an example of the amazing progress we’ve heard about. American ingenuity at its best. But what if I just stick it in a mailbox and it doesn’t get to where it’s supposed to go? And worse yet, where is the mailbox?
I finally stand up and very slowly make my way to the front of the class. At least I’m buying myself some time. Time! That’s it. I need to buy some more time to figure out what in the world she wants me to do with this piece of paper.
I take the paper from her and say, “I’ll post it later tonight,” and turn around and try to make my way back to my seat.
“Later tonight? What are you talking about?” Now everybody in the classroom is laughing.
“I’ll post it at home,” I offer.
“You’ll post it at home? This is not for your personal use young lady! I want you to post it here.”
OK. I think I’m going to start crying. I stand glued to the same spot.
“Just pin it to the wall!”
Now she wants me to put a pen in the wall? Is this some hazing ritual they do at American schools and if so, why isn’t this Michael character getting hazed? Is it something they only do to foreigners?
“Pen?” I ask tentatively.
“Pin.”
“A pen in the wall?”
She finally looses her cool, stomps over and grabs the sheet of paper out of my hands. “Post it to the wall, like this.” She walks back to the wall, removes a thumbtack from the backboard, puts the piece of paper against the wall and shoves the thumbtack through the top.
It was a fitting start to an English class. I learned two new words that day: post and pin.