Electric Pig

The headmaster and the vice principal stand on the stage. They are dressed, apparently in some bizarre Japanese custom, as waiters, and bow solemnly to the rising-sun flag. They take their places in the centre of the stage as class 3-1’s teacher announces the first of the 190 graduating students. This boy, chosen for the alphabetical placement of his name rather than any academic brilliance, is sadly slightly mentally sub-normal and clearly does not really know what is going on. However, his responsibilities have been mercilessly drilled into him and he walks to the centre of the stage and stands rigid to attention in front of the headmaster. As the headmaster reads this first graduation certificate out loud, from my position near the front of the stage I can see that, unbeknownst to the proud parents seated at the back of the hall, the boy is holding on, with grim determination, to his penis.

The ceremony continues. The first class files one-by-one onto the stage and collects their certificates. Class 3-2 replaces them. One of the “cool” boys demonstrates his boundless rebelliousness by saying “yes”, as his name is called, a few decibels louder than has been proscribed by the teachers. A palpable sense of thrill passes through the 2nd year girls seated near me. Another of the more daring boys, although sadly not as handsome as the first (he resembles a acne afflicted hedgehog), has the gall to spin round in a mock-boyband pirouette having collected his certificate, instead of the acceptable martial turn-and-step.  It is enough to make one of the 2nd year girls drop her programme in excitement. There is a collective intake of breath as the lovely but accident-prone boy with downs-syndrome mounts the stage and a collective exhalation in relief as he manages to collect his certificate and get back to his seat without falling over.

The main-certificate presentation over, it is time for the speeches. The headmaster, having only just descended from the stage, stands up again as his speech is announced and returns to the place he was standing not 15 seconds earlier. He begins a long and meandering speech about a 70’s TV drama, with lessons that he earnestly hopes will have some relevance to the students, none of whom are listening to him. He is followed by the head of the P.T.A; a man who has been elected to his role as some sort of cruel joke, as he has a speech impediment and clearly is not suited to this or any other form of public speaking. The 2nd year boys snigger in glee with each consonant he stumbles over. After his painful and unintentionally long speech, he beats a rapid retreat from the stage.

Next is the turn of the visiting dignitaries. Each of this motley collection of geriatrics is announced in turn by the Vice Principal. Surprised to hear their own names, they struggle to stand up, take a second to try to remember where they are and what it is they are supposed to be doing, mumble some barely comprehensible variation of “congratulations on your graduation”, then fart, sit down and go back to sleep.

30 minutes of this later, the students give speeches. The incredibly popular, academically gifted, unfeasibly handsome and utterly detestable leader of the student council is first. He gives a witty, touching and heartfelt speech. Teachers and parents beam approvingly, boys laugh admiringly at his jokes and girls tremble and melt in their seats. I feel a nausea that is only relieved with the comforting thought that in a few years time, the Japanese employment system will have beaten him down into a self-loathing salaryman. He is followed by a less gifted, less handsome, but more rotund boy, who gives a stunted, rambling speech, laden with unbelievably corny puns. I notice that I am the only one in the hall who applauds him.

The ceremony continues with messages from those who, through judicious rescheduling of their appointments, could not attend today. Past teachers, whose messages betray their relief at no longer working here, various unknown members of staff, local council members, the local police chief (known only too well by the majority of the 2nd years), people who live nearby and apparently someone who once drove past the school, all have messages of good luck and congratulations for the graduates. I find myself wondering absentmindedly whether the suit I am wearing, fitted in a backstreet tailor's in Vietnam during my more slimline days, is now doing irreparable damage to my testes.

After 2 hours, the ceremony finally draws to an end with an ill-advised rendition of a graduation song. Heavy on soprano parts, it is massacred by the hormonal, pubescent 2nd years. Final greetings are expressed, a few last bows to the flag and each other are squeezed in, and the 3rd years leave the hall to our applause. I wonder if the music from Schindler’s List is really an appropriate accompaniment.

There is a short break.  The graduates then leave the school for the final time, in tears now that the real world is encroaching on their sheltered lives for the first time. They are met by the 2nd year boys, who, with unbelievable lameness, run up to the popular 3rd years and ask for their class pins. The 3rd years gather at the gates and mill around, apparently at a loss for what to do with themselves at this first taste of freedom. They are greeted by a selection of the graduates from last year. As ever, these are the students who most vocally proclaimed that they would never return to school a year ago, and who have been the most frequent visitors ever since. They lead this year's graduates away to karaoke booths and the joys of underage alcohol. Another year’s graduation is over. The single kind, funny and charming class files off into the rest of their lives, abandoning the school to the clutches of the 2nd years. It is going to be very different around here from April...

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We go into the classroom. Most of the boys are standing around the kerosene heater, pumping out noxious fumes. The heater also smells vile. Girls are exchanging print-club stickers. Bullied boy is pressed into a corner, as Horse-Boy punches him mechanically in the stomach and slaps him around the head. Neither of them seem to be enjoying themselves. I wander over and stop him. “What? What?” he asks me. “We were just playing”. The chime for the beginning of the second class rings. The astonishingly ineffectual Japanese English teacher asks the kids to sit down. They don’t. We wait. He asks them again. They still don’t. We wait a little longer. After about three minutes, a couple of the “cooler” boys inform horse-boy and his team that he should sit down.

We go through the pointless greetings that no one ever replies to. Bored already, I look around the room. Four boys are asleep. One odd boy is carving runes into his desk. The actually-quite-clever-girl sitting at the back of the classroom is playing poker with her neighbour. Horse-boy is leaning back in his chair, a look of glee spread across his stupid face. The quiet, bullied mouse-girl looks a little nervous. She has the same look as the Jehovah’s Witness that stands outside my local station in the evenings looking forlorn. You can tell she is hoping for a worksheet-based lesson so she will be spared from having to interact with any of her classmates. We hand out the worksheet the other teacher has made. I glance at it and am once again speechless that anyone can make such absurdly “creative” use of English grammer. Mouse-girl seems relieved. Horse-boy suddenly shouts out “cock!”, for no discernable reason, and a few other boys snigger sycophantically.

The teacher tells them to start the worksheet. Bullied-boy and mouse-girl earnestly start. No one else does. Many kids are reading. I groan as I realise four are reading Harry Potter. I ponder whether JK Rowling realises what her execrable books are doing to the education system over here? I ask one of the other reading-boys to put down his history of World War II Japanese tanks and start the worksheet. “What? What? I AM doing the worksheet!” he says, putting the book on his lap. As I walk off, he picks up the book and carries on reading. Horse-boy shouts out “Knob!!” Guffaws follow.

Fifteen blissfully quiet minutes. Half the class are asleep, most with their blazers cunningly pulled over their heads to disguise them as non-sleeping students. Two girls are scrawling the names of members of androgynous boy bands in permanent marker on their desks, having just finished erasing the names of an earlier, entirely indistinguishable, favourite. The less-attractive of the two keeps looking over for her prettier friend’s approval. One girl is sitting on her boyfriend’s lap in a corner giggling with him and occasionally permitting him to kiss her. The actually-quite-clever-girl’s poker game continues, with her and her partner cunningly putting the cards into their desks and looking at their worksheet whenever I happen to approach them. I marvel at their skills of deception. Horse-boy shouts out “Pussy”. More guffaws, but this time accompanied by tuts of disapproval from the girls. Horse-boy looks confused. I don’t think he can quite comprehend these mixed signals.

“I’ve already finished”, suddenly exclaims bullied-boy. Horse-boy and his companions glare at him. He quickly realises his mistake and looks down at his desk. I imagine he is contemplating the extra beating he will get between classes as soon as we leave the room. Mouse-girl looks pityingly at him. She has learned to keep her mouth shut. Suddenly, Horse-boy’s mobile phone rings. With uncharacteristic agility he leaps up and sprints out of the classroom to the boys toilet. The teacher follows him. I wander to the door. The teacher is standing outside, politely asking him to come out. I can just hear horse-boy ignoring him and carrying on with his conversation with his mother. The other students are discussing what Horse-boy’s ringtone was. After about five minutes of heated debate, it is generally agreed that it was Backstreet Boys, something from their second album. I’m not surprised by his lack of taste.

Horse boy returns and starts to give us all a long description of his phone call. Apparantly it was from a high-school girl he is seeing. His followers give the appropriate response. He leans back in his chair with a satisfied grin. I wonder if I misunderstood and the word “mother” has some exotic meaning among 14 year olds? Perhaps he is more sexually experienced than I have given him credit for. He shouts out “penis”. Perhaps not.

We start the answer-checking part of the lesson. The teacher and I pointlessly read through the role-plays. The teacher gets into his role, firing out mispronounced words in a variety of ridiculous accents. The kids laugh at him. He glances at me with a look of pure triumph: “see, they love me, they really love me!” his expression says. Inside, I am again astonished at his lack of self-awareness. I try to concentrate on these pointless role-plays. The kids have an adept skill of carrying on their conversations only when we are talking. It is intensely annoying. I start to daydream about whether it would be worth sanctions and the probably sacking to smack the shit out of horse-boy or one of his kabal. It probably would be. I miss a line in the role-play.

The class comes to an end. Bleary-eyed students start to wake up. Bullied-boy and mouse-girl descend as usual into their seats, and look nervously at the clock. The chime rings. An electric current surges through the room. Horse-boy and his friends are out of the classroom before the chime has finished. Six girls rush in, desperate to share their gossip with the desk-writing girls. The teacher informs the few kids that are listening that he will give them an A- for today’s performance. Even considering that Japanese grades only go down to C, this is still idiotic. I wonder how exact an approximation of Lord of the Flies would be required for them to get a B or god forbid a C. I close my book, another 45 minutes gone that I will never be able to get back.