I'm really going to have to finally stop saying "goodbye." I've been in Indonesia for a month tomorrow, and saying farewell to Tuscaloosa, my home of 25-plus years is actually starting to annoy more than a few people. They want to hear about Indonesia. It's a big dad-gum archipelago with a lot of stories to tell, and I'm not about to become able to tell them all here in ten months. But I promised I'd give it a go. My ten-month fellowship has now been reduced to nine months, since students were gone to their home villages for Lebaran, the Indonesian form of the Muslim holiday Idul Fitri, marking the end of the holy month of Ramadan. This left me to spend a few days in Bali, and the rest of the month of Ramadan working on my personal adjustment problems. Lesson plans would have been more productive, but I've found it difficult to pin down what's expected, and almost no needs assessments - even informal ones - have been done. Sad times, and tough times ahead. So, who are the people I'm thinking about?
For the most part, it's the people in Tuscaloosa whose presence in my life has been a blessing during the 25-year stretch that I brought to an abrupt end four short weeks ago. The photograph below is my friend of more than 15 years, Richard. As you can see, he doesn't particularly care for having his picture taken. On my last day in Tuscaloosa, Richard was kind enough to take me out on Lake Tuscaloosa in his 2-man kayak. We rowed around the lake as a team - something we've been able to do far too few times this past decade - and talked about my future plans, silently agreeing to let stand my denial about being able to find work in Tuscaloosa in order to return there. It would be wonderful, but it's depressingly unlikely.
Scenes like these are the reason I am able to tell students that I miss my country, though I am truly glad to be in Indonesia! Now....let's get on with the present, even while missing the past.
Our time in Washington, DC, for the pre-departure orientation was shorter than I would have liked, since I got to meet so many people who have taught English in so many different parts of the world. In retrospect, I now realize that I didn't pay enough attention to much of the information briefings we were being given, but instead found it difficult to resist the temptation to treat the experience like any other ESOL educators conference, where textbook publishers are handing out or selling all sorts of wonderful stuff. But mainly, it was a chance to get to know dozens of new colleagues whose experiences are far wider and more extensive than my own. Having taught students in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, who have come from Yemen, Myanmar (Burma), China, and other places, it's quite an experience to meet other American teachers who have actually spent time teaching in my students' home countries. Despite my background and other limitations, most all of them seemed willing to treat me as a colleague, and that's an attitude that was appreciated more than they imagine. They offer a perspective I couldn't have gotten anywhere else, and I expect to spend months combing through "bios" and sending email messages. Most of my messages will simply say "Thank you!"
Washington has its difficulties, like any other U.S. city, but I am always glad to visit and as an American, I'm proud of our nation's capital. A few more random street-hiking photographs... Outside Union Station...always my favorite way to arrive in DC.
Our National Archives building, facing the Navy Memorial. "Thank you!" to all vets!
Pennsylvania Avenue looking toward the Capitol.
Civil War general on horseback...someone please remind me which one!
Archives, different angle.
Brick work on a sidewalk with some sort of Mesoamerican design, visually interesting and had me looking in the direction of my shoes for several minutes.
Fountain at the Navy Memorial. Water flowing over stones is a monument theme repeated often, probably because the sight and sound are both so peaceful.
Temerson Square on a Friday night...I wonder if Pontianak will have anything similar. When I don't have work or deadlines to worry about, I actually like crowds and noise, as long as someone isn't trying to make me dance just because "something told them" I probably had no rhythm.
I've always actually thought it quite an odd ritual. Whenever employees leave the Tuscaloosa Public Library, where I've been an outreach worker for about three years now, they are honored with a cake containing enough sugar to kill them several times over! It was seriously delicious, however, and the sentiment behind it appreciated beyond any words that might be written here.
The opportunity to live and work abroad is something I didn't anticipate ever being given at age 43. I also had no clue, until it became reality, how difficult Tuscaloosa, my home for a quarter century, would be to leave. As an 18-year-old boy, I came to this small, Southern college town for my education, and never left. Over the next three weeks, my presence here for better or worse will quickly fade, and I will, for the first time as an adult, be absent. Too much will be left unsaid, and far too many things left unfinished—all with no guarantee of ever being able to return.
It’s hard to know what kind of exile I’m going into. I think it’s one designed especially for English teachers. I want to teach English as a Second Language (ESL) to adults, but will likely never be able to do so in Alabama’s community college system as anything other than a 6-hour a week adjunct, who dashes in from a full-time day job quite unprepared to teach students, whose patience has been tried by the situation too many times, and who find little consolation in the fact that the class is free. Most universities will only give such a teacher a shot at full-time employment with previous university experience, and international teaching experience, also.
That’s why I’m going to Indonesia with Georgetown University’s English Language Fellows program, to teach at Tanjungpura University in Pontianak for 10 months. If have any hope or prayer, it’s that I last that long. There are many obstacles in my path.
On my last day in Tuscaloosa, Richard was kind enough to take me out on Lake Tuscaloosa in his 2-man kayak. We rowed around the lake as a team - something we've been able to do far too few times this past decade - and talked about my future plans, silently agreeing to let stand my denial about being able to find work in Tuscaloosa in order to return there. It would be wonderful, but it's depressingly unlikely.
