My Ex-Chinese Teacher

I saw a woman who looked like my high school Chinese teacher. I wondered whether they could have been related. Perhaps she was her cousin. Perhaps not. I don't know.

There was quite a lot of animosity between my Chinese teacher and I. As in, I didn't like her very much. She was in charge of my form class and a pain in my neck. She'd nag at how I should pack up my table and how I failed at Chinese.

Once, when I finally did pass one of my class test, she was surprised and sarcastic and remarked at how the sun might have risen from the west - meaning that it was an impossible and unlikely feat that I managed to pass. Never mind the fact that I probably cheated anyway, but that was not what a student who had finally passed something had wanted to hear. As much as I disliked her, I wanted her to say "well done" or something to that effect. I may still dislike her even if she commended me, but I still wanted to hear her commend.

She also told my mother at the parent-teacher meet that I wasn't going to get into a good school. Never mind that I eventually didn't. But her words really didn't help, and it pissed me off because it violated the expectations of what good teachers were supposed to be like. Good teachers as portrayed in school textbooks and advertisements for the teaching career. Nevermind that I wasn't a good student, I was a kid and I had room for improvement. On the other hand, all teachers should be good teachers, if not, then not a teacher at all.

I went to her funeral wake, after she passed away. I wonder why they call it a wake. The wake for the eternally asleep? It happened a few years after I graduated. She died of cancer, I think, one day. I wonder if she had suffered a lot. A few of my ex-schoolmates gathered to go to pay our respects. It was one of the first funeral wakes that I went to. At least a non-family-related one. As a kid, I was usually excused from attendance.

Prior to that, I had already heard that she was unmarried. As a cruel student, I had probably called her an old virgin woman, behind her back. I didn't understand what it really meant, until at the wake, I noticed that it was quiet. There were no children by the altar or many people around when I was there. I think that her only sibling was a brother, whom she lived with. Either that, or I might have remembered it wrongly, and I just thought it was quiet because I was quiet. I think the casket was opened, but I didn't go and see.

I dreamt of her. After she died. I dreamt of her, a few times. Once, several years ago, in a dream, she told me that I was a bad person, and that she was dead. As in, she told me that she was dead in my dream. So, I was pretty spooked and feeling pretty guilty. Was I really a bad person?

Perhaps I shouldn't have defied her so much while she was alive, and she was my teacher after all. But somehow I had developed a self-righteous attitude that I wouldn't respect anyone simply for her position of authority, and that she ought to convince me that she should deserve my respect. I don't know if I believe in that still. Anyway, I would think that if she were a good teacher, as portrayed in movies and television shows, she would have understood that I was just a kid who was feeling empowered to rebel against teachers, but was just really being stupid. Then again, she was not a good teacher. And may not have understood me, or might not have even cared.

Then who was she? She was a human being. And human beings die. So she's dead.

And does a dead human being care about being a good teacher? No, the dead don't care.

Who cares? The living. Not all of the living though. Only human beings. Not all living human beings though. Only stupid ones. Like me.

(For my Ex-Chinese teacher, and other dead ex-teachers, RIP.)