Ansila Ummer

UAE

The new teacher

“Aren’t you the one who applied in the angels school?” asked a lady in a blue tee and jeans. She probably looked like she was from the Philippines. She, along with some others, were cleaning off the mud from playing in the beach, while I was waiting for my friend, who had gone to the loo. And then I recognized her from the school I had gone to apply for a job. She was the principal of the elementary building. “Yes, ma’am. I had applied.” “Ah! I remember your face from the forms, sitting on the table,” she said, and we both chuckled. Well, I never left a space I knew when I was applying. I had even tried in schools where English was not even the medium for teaching. After we had a small conversation, she asked me to meet her at school, once it reopened. 

I was overjoyed about it. Not only did she recognize me, the way she came up to me to talk and invite me to school was something I never expected. And later, when I came back, she did give me a chance to demo. She said I would be better at high school.

I got a job there as a math teacher. The students were Arabs, of all kinds. The staff were a mixture of Pakistanis, Indians, Egyptians and all other Arabs and Philippines. Majority were Arabs. The school was based on an American curriculum. There was this colleague, an Egyptian, who gave me a hug and a piece of fatayer once she saw me. Similarly, different people displayed empathy uniquely and embraced one another.