“Those that educate children well are more to be honoured than those who produce them; for those only gave them life, these the art of living well,” Aristotle. For the uninitiated, October 5 is the world Teachers’ Day.
Please take some time and honour a teacher. I shudder to imagine how the person ‘next to you’ would have turned out if there were no teachers in their life.
It is a time to celebrate the teacher who is increasingly becoming an endangered species. A teacher’s job has become harder than that of a policeman. The latter can use handcuffs, teargas, rubber bullets or even live ammo to subdue rogue elements.
Today’s teacher is practically impotent while dealing with students high on banned substances, some of which are even stronger than weed.
In countries like the USA, gun-toting teenagers mow down classmates and their teachers for sport. There were days when teachers were highly respected. Oh, how I miss those good days! Ngugi Wa Thiong’o captures such times aptly in his novel ‘The River Between’ in the person of Waiyaki, whose every word the villagers of Kameno hung onto.
Kabonyi, a character in the novel, even administers an oath in the name of Waiyaki. It is also a time to condemn pretenders and quacks that have infiltrated the profession. Fellows who rape school girls have no business wearing the badge of a teacher. In colleges, cases of ‘sexually transmitted degrees’ abound. Girls are parting their legs to first class degrees. Shindwe!
Dreaded bully
Mwalimu Socrates and teachers of old would riot in their graves if they got wind of such. Teachers of yore religiously followed King Solomon’s advice of not spoiling the kid by sparing the cane. That did not prevent some of us from being mischievous.
I must apologise to my primary school deputy headmaster for pelting him with rotten eggs at night at the market centre while watching the then popular factual movies.
To my upper primary arts and craft teacher, it was not a cat that ate your stew and rice that day you sent me to take water to your house. Please, forgive me sir. Methinks such an apology coming at a time when the Sunday sermon is still fresh on your mind is in order. In fact, I am willing to buy a kilo of ‘tumbukiza’ as a way of saying ‘pole’. That is, if you still have the teeth to chew with.
I can also confess that it was Gidi who urinated into the teachers’ drinking water. The then dreaded bully is safely six feet under and can’t get back at me.
And finally, am not the one who nicknamed you black demon sir. Allow me to honour some of my teachers: ‘Amin’, our primary school headmaster; retelling my primary school ‘creative compositions’ at the local pub as you took a swallow motivated me to write more.
Mr. Kaye, a Ugandan who introduced me to literature, while in exile from the murderous regime of Uganda’s Idi Amin Dada. Madam Oduor, it is indeed to you that I owe the decision to study literature at Kenyatta University. Your threats ‘to cut my tail’ at Highway Secondary School, if I didn’t write legibly, still haunts me.
KU lecturers like Teyie, Osotsi, Gachanja and Nana Tagoe really inspired me. John Ruganda and Francis Imbuga too left a mark. Professor Bukenya, I can still hear your vocal cords vibrating on ‘scholarly paper’.
I also salute the Meta Meta Secondary school team where I teach: Madam Schola, for keeping the rumour mill well oiled, Madam Annette for helping dilute Wangu Wa Makeri’s dictatorial tendencies, and Magarita, the CU patron, for the prayers that have apparently kept the TSC team at bay.
And the school head, Mr Okonkwo, please stop using teacher appraisals as tools for intimidation. Happy Teachers’ Day to all teachers of the world in advance!
Socratesmwalimu@gmail.com
