silence

i have not felt much like writing this last week. life is gently guiding me into a place of silence and i am happy to acquiesce, hoping for more peace to bloom inside of me along the way. today,however, i feel like writing... as allowing words to spill out occasionally becomes like a mutated form of cheap therapy for me. this blog is, after all, a handy dumping ground for stories like the one below.

first, a few pictures from the capital city. fall is finally here:




second, quotes i find inspiring and relevant as i wade through the silence:

"Silence is the most powerful scream." -anon.
"The best answer to anger is silence." -anon.
"Silence is the source of great strength." Lao Tzu
"Spiteful words can hurt your feelings but silence breaks your heart." -anon.
"We need silence to be able to touch souls." -Mother Teresa

third, a story:

it's tuesday again. tuesdays are turning out to be incredibly unpredictable days not helped by the fact that my hardest classes are on these days.

today, my counterpart filed a police report against a student's parent for physical harassment.

but wait, let me back up to yesterday morning.

several of my colleagues and i were catching up in the hallway. as we chatted, a fight broke out between a group of, we'll say at least 4, 5th grade boys. right in front of us, yes literally right before our eyes.

there were little fists flying and tears streaming from faces filled with more rage than i have ever seen someone of that age exude. hurtful words launched from one mouth to another among these little boys, one of them repeatedly screaming "you dirty rat" at a pitch that made my insides curl.

i grabbed one of the boys (feeling more confident than i did two weeks ago grabbing a much bigger 9th grade boy) and wrapped my arms around him while he continued to shout in my ear. my colleagues managed to take control over several of the other boys. none of this seemed to phase any of the antagonists as they continued kicking, wailing, screaming, fighting, and despairing as we attempted to at least navigate them far enough away from each other to avoid injury. my colleagues explained that they had to pinch the ears of these kids because sometimes,nothing else works to detain them. i told them i would stick to bear hugging as i did not feel comfortable with the amount of touch involved with ear pinching.

i wish i could have captured the rage in the eyes of this one child, a 5th grade boy which makes him about 10 years old i suppose. the anger burning in his eyes mirrored the overt and palpable rage between roma boys and non-roma boys that wanders through our halls every day. this is a rage that they are learning young, it would seem. this was a fight about the sharp division between the two groups egged on by the unrelenting screaming of "you dirty rat" in the language here.

the mother of one of these boys arrived at school this morning unpronounced. i saw her in between classes waiting quietly in the hallway. i asked if i could help her with anything to which she refused my help. moments after i passed her, one of my colleagues from the fight yesterday stepped out of her classroom. this mother moved immediately towards the teacher and began wailing on her, fists flying and screaming ringing through the hall. she couldn't believe this colleague had grabbed her son's ear. apparently he had told her.


only the security guard was able to keep this woman from tearing the face off of my counterpart. and he was able to do it only long enough for the police to come.




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