“Call back later, I’m busy, ok?”
Thanks, L!
The recruiter told me that she’d have an answer for me on Monday. It’s now Tuesday afternoon, and I’ve been brushed off. Thoughts have been crowding in. “I need to give notice by the end of next week!” “I don’t want to go to work today!” “I don’t want to work here any more!” “I’ve got to do something!”
It’s taking a good deal of difficulty to remind myself that I don’t have to do anything. Yes, it’s true that if I want to avoid being contractually obligated to give 4 weeks notice to the school I’m working at now, I need to give notice by 28 November – the end of my trial period. But it’s also true that the only thing they have hanging over me is the payment of ½ month’s salary… which I’d make in about 3 days in the job I interviewed for. The school I’m working at now can’t sue me – or they can, but they won’t. I know this for an incontrovertible fact. The worst they can do is cancel my visa, in which case I buy a new one. I wouldn’t feel at all bad giving no notice to this school – because I don’t need the reference, they’ve treated me like utter shit, and fundamentally there’s no difference between giving immediate notice on Friday the 28th or Monday the 1st… because either way they still need to find a new teacher, and 2 days (except from the contract’s point of view) make no difference whatever.
So, the truth is that I don’t have to give notice by the 28th at all. That’s that thought.
Do I want to go to work today? No. I enjoy my Monday, Wednesday, and Friday classes, but I don’t at all enjoy the Tuesday and Thursday ones. Why? Well… could it have something to do with the fact that I teach straight through from 4 until 10? Maybe with the fact that the students in my first two classes are teenagers who don’t actually want to be there, and won’t do anything without my expending significant mental and physical energy? That it really does physically hurt for me to expend the amount of energy needed to get a bit of enthusiasm or laughter out of them? I don’t know. I’m hesitant to blame the students. Maybe, the thought now is, that I’ve just taken a dislike for no reason to my Tuesday and Thursday classes? But that cannot be. Feelings don’t come for “no reason.” This deep antipathy to teaching at Strogino must come from somewhere.
What is it about the Monday and Wednesday classes? The class is pre-intermediate adults. They speak little English, but they are keen to learn and are full of good humor, energy, and enthusiasm. I have a great time teaching them, and will be sad to lose them when I quit. Even my Monday and Friday teenagers – advanced level – love to laugh and are not afraid of looking foolish. They like to swear a lot to try to show off their “cool-ness” but as long as it’s in English and they understand and work with the grammar and vocab I’m trying to teach them, who cares if they swear?
Both of these classes are denominated by great good humor, which is utterly absent from my Tuesday and Thursday classes. The attitude I bring to teaching them is different… but is that a cause of or a result of my dislike of them? Which came first? In the beginning, I tried to like teaching these classes. Why did I stop?
So the truth is… well, the truth is that I find teaching these classes to be utterly loathsome. And the truth is that to maintain my income and residence in Moscow until I can successfully get another job, I choose to teach these classes anyhow. The truth is that the money and place to stay rank higher on my scale of values right now. The truth is also that if I didn’t have to worry about money and a place to stay – if I could find interim measures – I’d quit this afternoon.
The next thought… “I don’t want to work here any more.” Why is that? To be sure, I don’t mind teaching on Mondays and Wednesdays. The American teachers (why only the Americans? Though I must say one is from a town of 100 people in Kentucky, and the other is from Abilene, TexASS – so both have all the prejudices and narrow-mindedness endemic in southern towns) are pretty horrible – their minds are narrow and they have no conversation at all, but I don’t need to have much interaction with them. The British teachers are very nice indeed, and two of them (my roommate, and one other) I especially like, and get on well with. They have somewhat expanded minds and good conversation. I can discuss many things with them – Richard Dawkins and atheism (both are atheists), academia, Moscow life, job searching, etc – and while I wouldn’t count them as bosom buddies (and while I can’t discuss philosophy or the family with them, which prevents me from becoming close to them at all), I do like being around them for short periods. With the Americans, no topic except drinking and how loathsome their students are can be broached. Why should that be? I don’t understand it.
So… the truth is that I don’t actually mind working where I am. I knew about the low pay before I signed up. I needn’t have much intercourse with the American teachers, thank god. The Brits, the Brazilian, and the New Zealander are actually quite nice. There are opportunities to expand my abilities as a teacher by taking part (unpaid, of course) in seminars and workshops on teaching techniques, etc. The only things I really abominate are the classes I teach on Tuesday and Thursday, and the unpaid overtime.
“I’ve got to do something!”
Well… really, I don’t. I could continue in this sober round of days for many years. I am not in any imminent danger. I have a place to sleep, enough to eat, and the prospect of some time to travel – though not, if I continue to work here, the money to pay for said travel. I have been in many worse positions in my life. I’m in a better position than when I first moved to Dallas, for example. In the worse case scenario I would move back to NYC and beg to crash on someone’s couch till I got an apartment and an IT job – or any job, really. That’s not too bad of a case.
In fact, this interlude is actually good in showing me what I abominate – what I can’t stand, or at least don’t like. It’s good for showing me lots of things about this authentic self I’m becoming.
But it is – in about half an hour – time to go to Strogino. I’m feeling the usual tightness in my neck, just on the right side. I really don’t want to go. It would make me feel so good in the short term to quit and not have to go today, or to call in sick and avoid going. But long-term, it’s not sustainable.
What is a higher priority: a place to sleep, or following my feelings? That’s probably the wrong way to ask the question – or the wrong question to ask. There’s got to be a way I can get both. There’s got to be a way I can satisfy both my physical needs and emotional ones.
What way? I don’t know. I’m soooo tempted to pin all this anxiety on one thing – on L’s not telling me whether or not I got the job. Or even whether or not the parents have made a decision. But really… L is not the lynchpin of my life. She’s not the arbiter of my fate. My life is not waiting on her decision. But oh, it’s sooooo tempting to think “She is making me feel this!”
But she isn’t. Why, then, should I not be happy to think that because I am responsible, I only have the power to act?
They gave me activated charcoal tablets to swallow. Each one burst in my mouth in a carbon-y shower. The nausea, however, isn’t caused by something I ate, and won’t be ameliorated by any tablet or potion.
I feel sick each time I think of teaching at Strogino. I keep thinking of calling in sick, or walking away. Last Thursday I nearly did just walk away – I was 10 paces down the sidewalk when I turned back… but I thought of you. Of all of you. And of a night in May where, casually, on one of those late-night calls that I so miss, I mentioned that I’d walked away from my final exams.
I thought of you, my friends, and that stopped me. Thank you. And, of course, all kudos to the boys upstairs, who reminded me of that night. Thank you, my dears. I appreciate you.
Today is my first day going to teach there since Tuesday. I do not want to. There’s nothing saying I must, of course… except the fact that. Well, no. Let’s rephrase that – courtesy of those book extracts that GG posted today. “I am choosing to teach at Strogino today because I do not want to lose my job and the housing it provides. I am choosing to teach at Strogino today because I would like a place to stay until I either find something better or choose to leave Russia, and I don’t want to spend the money or undergo the anxiety of staying in a hostel and waiting – and hoping – that I’ll soon be hired. I am going to Strogino today because I am a bit frightened of what will come to pass if I don’t – and I’m not sure how to resolve that yet.”
The prospects of getting another job soon are not that unfavorable. Yesterday I had an interview at an agency which is putting me up for a job immediately. In all likelihood I’ll be meeting the mother of my potential pupil tomorrow. There is another agency which is also looking at potential jobs for me, and I should get a few offers from that place as well.
Due to the visa vagaries of Russia, if I resign my current job they’ll cancel my visa, and I’ll have 10 days to leave the country. I’ll have to go to Ukraine for between 1 day and 1 week, where the Russian embassy there will issue me with another visa – once I’ve got a job offer lined up and a priglashenie issued. So I can’t quit this job until I’ve got another one – or, no. If I want to follow the path of least resistance, government hassle, and expense, I shouldn’t quit this job until I’ve got another.
Trying to take responsibility in these decisions. It’s a difficult, conscious effort right now. But it feels better. It really does actually feel better to know that I’m not at anyone’s mercy. That I’m not hard done-by. That no one is making me stay or making me quit – and that no one has the power to make me do anything.
I don’t want to leave Russia. I quite like it here, oddly enough. There’s money to be made here – and I’m here to make money to finance my travels and mountaineering and returning to university if I decide to do that.
I should leave now for Strogino if I want to get there. I researched hostels today – $20 a night will get me a dorm bed near the Old Arbat. Maybe tomorrow. After the interview with this woman – we’ll see how it goes.
This was the thing I wanted to write about on the board, and I’ve not covered it fully. I would love to speak with some of you about this – not about my situation, necessarily… but about these new feelings of almost (almost!) joy in taking the responsibility, and feeling free – even under stressful circumstances – to act in my own behalf. And the growing feeling that there’s someone behind me who wants to see me happy – not just you, my friends, and not just my conscious ego… but others.
And thanks to Andrea, my inner 5-year-old wants a toy. I shall have to go to the toy shop to get her one. :)
I’ve been asked to do what new teachers are almost never (or shouldn’t be) asked to do: to teach two advanced level and one elementary level class. New teachers are invariably (or should invariably be) given intermediate-level classes. I have one… but only one.
Two of these classes – one of them advanced level – are classes of teenagers. 15- and 16-year-olds who do not want to learn English, and let you know it. Defenses and projection abound. I understand why this is and I feel sorry for the children – their parents and culture have conspired to completely fuck them up – because it’s not really their fault. However, in 2 hours a week, I can do very little to break down their defenses. Especially not when they come in groups of 10.
I refuse to be around adults whose defenses and general attitude make it impossible to communicate with them… so why – especially when it’s extremely unfair (and absolute crap for the students as well) to have a new teacher put in with advanced students – should I teach classes that I don’t want, and with which I can do nothing?
I talked with the assistant director of students this morning, trying to find a way to give these classes to more experienced teachers. He basically told me to suck it up. I understand and don’t fault him – he must look to the school’s bottom line, after all – but… it made me extremely upset to know that I’ll be stuck trying to make the best of this until June. I felt trapped. I felt hurt. I felt invisible. One thing J kept saying is that “All teachers feel this way initially.” I’m sure they do. When you are trapped, it is a horrid feeling.
I was on the verge of tears and decided to take a walk. Without initially knowing where I was going, I headed off in the direction of Kuntsevskaya Metro – away from the school. As I walked down the hill amidst birch trees filled with chirping birds, I realized something:
I’m not trapped.
Despite what J made the situation out to be, there are at least two options. One is to go off-contract, which means that I could choose the classes I want – but it also means that I have to arrange my own flat and my own visa, which is extremely expensive. The other option is to leave Russia altogether and head for Czech Republic or Turkey – or Berlin, London, or Buenos Aires, for that matter.
My problem is not with Russia. It is not with teaching. I like Russia- I do not love it, but Russia exerts a strong pull on me. The people here make almost a religion out of worshipping strength. It is fascinating to observe Russia, and Russians. I do not want to leave. I also do not have a problem with teaching. My adult classes – both the pre-intermediate and the advanced ones – are lovely. Even the 10-year-old children that I teach on Tuesdays and Thursdays are sweet – and great fun to teach. I do not want to stop teaching them.
Is my problem even with the teens? Not really. They are inevitably what they have to be here, and their feigned indifference is their best and only defense. Fine. However… I do not think that I can do a good job with teaching them. I refuse to sit idly by and let them spend the entire class chatting in Russian… but I’m also not willing to spend my time and energy reaching them. I probably could, on a level… but to tell you the truth, it’s just not worth it to me.
As bad as it sounds… they’re just not a priority. Reaching them is not a priority for me. It is not something I wish to plow 110% of my time and energy into achieving.
The teens deserve a teacher who is willing to put in such time and energy. Someone who wants to make this a career, or at least wishes to improve their teaching to a level that will enable them to get through. I also deserve to have my needs met – not by J or by the school, but by myself. J does not owe me the right to refuse to teach teens – it is in my contract that I cannot refuse – but I owe myself the recognition of my own priorities, needs, and desires.
That’s what I learned on the way to Kuntsevskaya Metro. Not that I don’t want to teach teens. Not that J doesn’t owe me anything. Not even that I’m not trapped. But that I need to do all I may to improve my situation, and meet my needs and desires, and honor my feelings.
J has requested another parley. Here it goes. :)
…I’m sitting here at Tverskaya school. There’s some sort of obligatory seminar that I have to attend about how and what to teach to advanced level students. It might be useful… but I don’t want to be here.
I want to be about 8 years in the future, standing in a university classroom with a Raphael painting projected on a screen and a group of about 8 students ranged in front of me.
I began thinking this morning: my favorite professor does not have tenure. She does not make 6 figures. She doesn’t get any time “off” in the summer – it’s all spent in researching. If you count the amount of time she actually spends preparing for lessons, she makes about as much as a Wal-Mart manager.
What, exactly, is so wrong with being a professor, if that’s what you want to do? If that’s what you love? If that’s what you’ve wanted to do since you were 12 and – try as you might – NO argument will eradicate that desire from your soul?
I began thinking this in the shower as I was getting ready to leave for this bloody seminar. I kept giving myself arguments why I should not do what I want to do. I walked to the metro. By the time I got to Filiovsky Park, it was settled. Two stations passed. At Bagrationovskaya I began to wonder whether this is not just a reaction to my first few days in Russia, which have gone hard. Two stops passed. At Kutuzovskaya (amusing how Russia’s two greatest generals – my two favorite “real” people in War and Peace – are separated by only one metro stop) I realized… I don’t want to go back to Columbia. The desire is not to run to the “safety” of the university. The desire is what it has always been: to teach. NOT English – I am resenting that right now… which I hope will go away. This resentment of having to teach English is… sigh.
But no. To actually share my love of something with people and have them receive it and be interested and love it too. Sitting on the grass with my friends outside a castle and recounting ancient history and having them actually be interested. I want that. I want more of that.
I’m going to stay in Russia. I’m not going to run away. But when I think of sitting in an office for 40 years, I feel sick. When I even think of non-stop travel for the next 40 years, I am not glad in my heart. When I think of the professoriate – even though I will never be granted (and do not want to be granted) tenure, even though my stuff will never be published, even though in a big way it’s the harder road… still, the desire is there – undiminished since age 12.
Given a why, it’s said, one can bear almost any how. In the spring I lost my why, but I think I’ve found it again – somewhere between Bagrationovskaya and Kutuzovskaya on the Moscow metro.
So I’ve set up an interview with a language school in Moscow. It’s a sweet position – salary is only $1200 a month, but that’s free of Taxes. It also includes a fully-furnished, all-bills-paid apartment, health care, all transportation and visa expenses, 22 paid vacation days, and I’ll get both a contract-end and Christmas bonus, each equal to a month’s salary.
Frankly, all I’ll need to spend money on in Moscow is food and entertainment. And since both can be had relatively cheaply… yay! Just the Christmas bonus alone will nearly pay the guide and permit fees for Kilimanjaro. And, of course, the contract is academic-year-only, which means 9 months. So I have 3 months off in which to go climbing.
The war with Georgia seems to be quite in hand, so… I see very little reason why I shouldn’t at least do the interview.
I’ve also got an interview for Mongolia in the works. Hello Ulaanbaatar!
…I’ve applied for jobs in:
Moscow, Russia
St. Petersburg, Russia
Surgut, Siberia, Russia
Jakarta, Indonesia
Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia
Rzeszow, Poland
Not my first choices (Moscow is my 3rd choice, actually) but hey, needs must. After I complete my first year’s contract, everything will open up to me.
From the pictures, Ulaanbaatar is a rather nice place. I don’t like mutton, though.
Yes, I am far too busy. But it is a pleasant sort of busy.
Taught my first 40-minute lesson yesterday. I quite enjoyed it! I teach again tomorrow.
Learning loads. Beginning to send out query letters for jobs. So far, mostly in Russia. I might be spending this long, cold winter in Moscow! Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeexcellent. :D
Flatmate and her two children are very nice indeed. Beautiful views of London. No pictures as I’ve broken my camera. Alas!
