Tuesday, August 19, 2014 "What Am I Supposed to Do?"

Tuesday, August 19, 2014
Week: 1
Songs to Remember: Quit Playing - U-Kiss

        For the first day of school, I wake up early. Second day comes, excitement's over and I want to sleep in.

        So my first period's kinda become my resting period (World History), resting as in recovering from waking up so early. The teacher is pretty chill, chill as in, not rushing into class as soon as possible, unlike another teacher *cough* Algebra II/Trigonometry *cough*. So far we haven't done anything history related in her class, besides getting our textbook. Tomorrow we'll probably be starting the lesson.

        2nd period (English 2A) is still pretty calm (for now). It's always calm before the storm. Next thing I know, I'm scrambling on my computer trying to finish an essay. Today all we talked about these "Life-long Learning Standards". You know, those "Students will be collaborative workers who" etc etc. You can search up "Life-long Learning Standards" and probably find what I'm talking about. Anyways, we just discussed it the whole period. My teacher wants everybody to talk, more participation and discussion, but nobody seems to wanna talk. Probably 'cause we're all good kids.

        Chemistry has got to be favorite class so far, along with Chinese of course. I sat down in my seat, with Yue (the hot girl I talked about) next to me and I'm having the mindset like "I won the f***ing lottery", just, oh my god. The next thing I know, the teacher tells us all to stand up, out of our seats, and move to the sides of the classroom. My expression is just like "No, no, no, no, no, this cannot be happening" But it's happening, we're changing seats.

        I'm just like "Fffffffffff, why god, why? You gave me this and now you're taking it away from me? It only lasted one day". So as I was standing on the right side of the classroom, Yue and her friend standing in front of me, Yue's looking at me and I'm just staring off into the distance 'cauuuusee, I'm scared to look people in the eyes, it's like looking into their soul.

        So the teacher's like "Okay, I put all your names into a machine and it randomized all your seating" and he began calling out people's names for their assigned seat. I was just praying, like, "Please, oh my god, please, at least let me be close to her, at least". About 4 columns of seats left (2 columns are connected), teacher called some people, and then me. 2 empty columns of seats to my right, I'm hoping that Yue sits like, remotely close to me.

        The teacher calls everyone's names besides Yue and this one other girl. He then sits them at a lab table, all the way to the left where I can't even see her. The guy I'm sitting next to is like a senior and he's on the football team, probably about twice my height, not gonna lie. So I'm just like "Why?". The teacher then tells everybody that we're going to be going to get our textbooks at the bookroom, not too far from our classroom.

        We all get up and out the door (in sort of a line). I'm standing behind Yue, she doesn't appear to be talking to her friends. She turns around and faces me, eye contact meets, mostly 'cause I chose to, I'm getting sweaty, I'm thinking "Ooooohhhh myyyy ggooooooodd", and she's "Hey" and I'm like "Hi". Yue and I start talking a bit. She explained that she was from was from Malaysia and moved here since last September (2013). She asks me if I was born here and I'm like "Yeah". There were some quiet parts, I mean, I'm not really sure what to talk about, I guess I was still in shock that this is happening to me. I mean, what am I supposed to do? So I'm like "Okay, I'll just stick with school stuff. It's safe, on subject, and fun, sorta".

        I ask her "So what classes are you having difficulty with?" And she's like "Ugh, Honors Pre-Cal" and she's "Oh I'm a Senior, I'm taking it to boost my gpa up". And that basically confirms it for me that "Oh, well, this is 100% chance of bad". We get back to class, as we're walking through the classroom door, Yue's like "Do you have any friends here?" And I'm just like "Okay Drew, breathe, just breathe, don't die on me damn it!" I answer "I know some people here, but I don't talk to them much". And she's like "You can talk to me, you can talk to me anytime" with that slight accent of hers and I'm just like "Mhmm".

        She goes back to her new seat, I go back to my new seat, the teacher passes us all this work sheet, it being a "text-book scavenger hunt" which is like "Find 'pineapple' in the glossary" and "What chapter is chapter 11 about?", that sorta stuff. I do as much as I can, the bell rings, I leave, we all leave, I go to P.E. I really need to talk to my teacher about changing my seat, I hope he understands, good thing he met his wife in high-school, soooo, yeah.

        P.E was pretty much the same. They took roll, told us some info, let us buy our uniforms, and had us in line for our lockers. And of course they can't just be like "Okay, choose a locker", they got to assign us all one. My friend and I are standing in line, talking about random stuff. We get to the front of the line, the teacher comes out from the teacher office in the locker room, says "Sorry guys, you're gonna have to come back tomorrow". I'm like "Fffffffffff".

        My friend and I and the rest of the guys in line, we all walk out to lunch, upon hearing the bell ring. But, it was only the P.E bell (which always goes off), and that bell is supposed to be the bell for P.E teachers to send their students back to the locker rooms to change. It's like, 10 minutes before the actual dismissal bell. So we all walk out, I hear my name but I'm so far away I didn't really know if they calling me specifically.

        So during lunch, my friend tells me that we were supposed to stay inside and how we weren't supposed to leave yet. He also said that the teacher was gonna threaten us with a cut, but he's like "I don't think she saw you so you're fine". I'm like "What the f***?" The teacher said to come back tomorrow, the bell rings, I infer that we waited so long in line the period ended so we were allowed to go. I mean, the teacher did say to come back tomorrow, he didn't say to come back tomorrow after staying here for 10 more minutes. I could be my own lawyer.

        I eat lunch, talk to my buddies, do some of my unfinished Algebra II/ Trigonometry homework (hey, I only had 2 questions left to do. I didn't do em' last night in spite of my teacher). Bell rings, gates of hell open, I cry, knowing I have Algebra II/ Trigonometry next with that teacher. So my buddy and I both have that class, we go in, teacher's like "Okay class, today we'll be checking out textbooks so be sure to bring your ID card". We go get our textbooks, come back, it's pretty quiet, everyone's writing, I'm trying to get a head-start on the homework, I see that everyone's writing but their textbooks are not open.

        Then the teacher's like "Okay, let's go over the warm-up. I'm like "We had a warm-up?! Nobody even said a thing!" Good thing we didn't have to turn in our warm-up. She then gets started on the lesson, saying that we have to do the lesson before we attempt the homework. Not my type of thing, considering that if we need help, we could just look in our textbooks for the steps.

        Her accent makes it so difficult to understand what she's saying. She says "cross" instead of "plus". I didn't really understand about 35% of it, so I just went with the book as my guide. After she's done, she has us all pass up our homework. This one student was like "Umm, I wrote down my answers on the sheet you gave us". The sheet was like a 2 pages with the questions. Yesterday the teacher told us we could just write on the sheet OR we could write it on paper.

        So the teacher assistant takes a look at it and he's like "Yeah, this is points off" and the teacher's like "You didn't follow my instructions" and I'm like "Oh my god that is f***ing brutal. If that'd happen to me I'd f***ing try to switch to a different teacher as fast as possible. The thing about the teacher is that she wants us all to learn math in HER way, no matter if it's easier or harder than in your own way. Let's say an equation to solve would be "5x +2 = 12". I'd write my work like "5x = 10, x = 2". My teacher would have us all write it with the equal signs in the beginning like "10 = 5x, 2 = x" like that.

        My geometry teacher (good teacher, like his methods, isn't picky as long as you understand the work) would have us write it however we wanted, as long as we solved it correctly. He didn't even care how you formatted your paper. But this teacher, it's like "You have to write it like this, if you don't, I'm taking points off". Like, holy f***, the class won't be about learning Algebra II and Trigonometry anymore, it'll just be "Follow my instructions exactly". People will fail, not because that they don't understand it or get incorrect problems, but because of the grading. I'd understand college grading, but this is f***ing Algebra II/ Trigonometry in HIGH SCHOOL. Seriously. I could be my own lawyer.

        Anyways, I just finished a lot of homework tonight, about 90% of it is hers. So, 5th period ends, I hear angels sing, I see heaven as in the front door, and leave for 6th period. I sign in on the sheet at the front door, and there's a table with piles of different color-less pictures, like birds, dragons, about 8 different ones to choose from. I picked the dragon, just to be different. I sit down with El again, and today we're supposed to be coloring.

        I don't see how this has to do with the Chinese language, but I'm not complaining about her ways of teaching. As we're coloring, I'm talking with El a bit about stuff like her classes, yaddah yaddah yaddah, kinda awkward but we're both awkward so it's fine. The teacher also jokes around in Chinese and also helps us learn Chinese while we're coloring, asking us to repeat after her. Pretty cool, considering how we're in 6th period, we're relaxing while coloring, helps us focus our mind, helps take in the material better. See, now that's how to teach, not "I'm taking points off, You didn't follow my instructions".

        Anyways, class ends, homework is to finish coloring, that was it. And you know what? Yue was kinda looking at me a lot yesterday, and I was just staring into space. I don't know, I don'r really know what to talk about with El and Yue. And, I have no idea where Vt is at. Like, am I going to have to be asking around "Hey, do you know a Vt?"

        So Yue's a senior, if we do become good pals, or even more, it probably won't work out by the end of the year. She's gonna go to college, I'll still be here in high-school, it's a 2 year difference, aaand, it's just a 100% chance of bad alright. Like, what am I supposed to do? It's getting late, I'll see you guys tomorrow then. Oh, and uh, I have something pretty crazy to talk about tomorrow, something I found online.