by Shane Kotter
USA / Teacher
Guns hanging loosely on his hips, serape thrown over his shoulders, spurs clanging in the dirt with each step he takes, he paused to lift the brim of his hat and wipe the sweat from his forehead. It was ungodly humid in Kyushu in the middle of summer and our protagonist, The Teacher, was more suited to the dry heat back on the homestead in New Mexico.
He’d been around the world, walking alone, from Latin America to Asia, searching for his last job, that one final score that was going to have him sitting pretty for the rest of his career. He’d passed through a few countries doing a gig here, a gig there, before finding himself on an ALT dispatch job in the land of the rising sun.
Down at the saloon, the old-timers would tell stories about ¥250,000 minimum wages, social health insurance, subsidized furnished housing, and fair contracts. The reality was that there was an overabundance of wannabe gunslingers trying to work the place, like the two-timing gamblers and claim jumpers who tried to move in after the original settlers had blazed the trails of the American West. Wannabe gunslingers with little education, no work ethic, and not a pot to piss in pounced on any job no matter how poor the conditions.
The robber baron ALT dispatch companies quickly wised up to this and started offering less and less, acting with impunity on all of their money grubbing whims. Contracts were doctored so that the hours didn’t require paying into social health insurance. Articles were added that held these gunslingers liable for things in which they had no stake and that relieved the robber barons of any liability for their wrong-doings. Pay went south faster than a gang of bank robbers heading for Mexico.
The Teacher still rode into work and gave it his all everyday. While the teachers at his schools were busy drilling the kids with endless listen-and-repeat sessions or having them put their heads down and silently translate archaic English sentences into Japanese, he taught them how to speak real English in the hallways, in the cafeteria, in the gym after school. He created fun activities, participated in clubs, talked to the kids about their day, and gave them encouragement — a commodity which was in short supply.
Like a coal miner busting his hump for a board of directors in New York City, no matter how hard he tried, the robber barons were blind to the cause. They were busy counting bags of money, covering up and hiring new gunslingers when old ones skipped town on their shady contracts, and micromanaging every aspect of their highly organized operation.
A real teacher’s got an obligation to his kids, but he’s also got an obligation to himself, and The Teacher couldn’t look himself in the mirror with dignity if he continued to play human tape recorder and be treated by the robber barons like a pawn on a chessboard. When a man can’t make an honest living in an honest profession like education it might be time to move on, he thought as he sipped his shochu, the closest thing he could find to tequila in those parts.
Just then, a pretty little thing in a pinstriped skirt and jacket entered the saloon –a headhunter– one of the real cowboys of the Wild Wild East. She handed him her card and started on about exciting opportunities for an experienced teacher, a true gunslinger like himself, in the Middle East. “You know, I’ve been offered a lot of things in my life,” he told her dryly as he sipped his drink straight, “but none of them seem to pan out the way that they say they will.”
He looked around and saw that the saloon was flooded with out of work gunslingers– some who had escaped bad contracts in other countries, some just looking for a ride on the gravy train, unaware that it had pulled out of station long before they arrived. Everyone was in a panic because the economy was limping along like a wounded dog, and in general the whole industry was starting to stink like the horse stables on a ranch.
He looked around and saw that the saloon was flooded with out of work gunslingers– some who had escaped bad contracts in other countries, some just looking for a ride on the gravy train, unaware that it had pulled out of station long before they arrived. Everyone was in a panic because the economy was limping along like a wounded dog, and in general the whole industry was starting to stink like the horse stables on a ranch.
The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly: That’s what today’s students trying to learn English, many of the wannabe gunslingers, and the robber barons that pimp out ALT’s like ladies of ill-repute The Teacher reckoned. English language education should not be treated like a widget pieced together in a sweatshop – at the lowest possible cost, with the lowest quality, to achieve the greatest profit.
Should The Teacher saddle up again and head for Abu Dhabi? Should he force a showdown with the robber barons? Should he pack his trusty rucksack and head back to New Mexico? Dodesho?
