My First Visit to Noyemberyan high School

Thursday December 4, I went to visit an English teacher’s classes at the Noyemberyan Secondary school.  A week before, the student my co-worker Ruzan’s tutors after my class asked me if I would consider visiting her school so they could hear a native speaker.  I gave her my phone number and her teacher was calling me the next day.  The teacher called me several times when I was teaching my adults class. I kept hitting ignore and she kept calling.  She finally sent a text message telling me who she was.  I replied that I was in class but would call her back as soon as I could.  She texted back an apology for interrupting,

I returned her call as I walked home after class. She told me that she would like for me to visit and talk to students in English as a native speaker and perhaps read to them. She told me her first name was Hripsime.  She asked me to come to school at 9:30 to meet with her and then her students. I agreed to the idea and was looking forward to being in a high school age classroom for the first time in almost a year.

On Wednesday, I began thinking I should let people know where I would be at the time we usually had coffee at work.  I told Ruzan about my visit because it was her student who had arranged the call from the teacher.  She offered to come with me or to arrange for one of the other English-speaking people in our office to accompany me.  I told her that I would be fine; it was only a school visit and I have done thousands of those.  I did ask what I should do when I first arrived.  She told me to call the teacher before I went inside. In America, I would call the teacher to get clearance from security, so it made sense to me.

I arrived at the school a little early, my usual practice.  I do not know if I will ever be able to adapt to the Armenian sense of schedule, simplistically defined as, whenever.  Before I went inside, I called the number the teacher had used to contact me the week before.  I received a voice message explaining the number was unavailable. So, I sent a text saying I was in the building.

I walked inside and looked for the security desk like every school in America has. There was no security desk.  There was no main office with secretaries and a principal, or at least not one in close proximity to the front doors (which were unlocked and open). I saw a map of the school that looked like an evacuation/ fire drill map.  I had no idea what it said but saw the areas pointing to stairways and exit doors.  There were numbers on the various rooms, but I had no idea in what room she taught.  I looked in an open door to see if it was perhaps an office. It looked like it was a meeting room of some sort with a long table and chairs around it. I turned around and began walking towards the steps leading to a main hallway.

Okay dear reader, now first I want you to picture a moderately sized school with a hallway that I could tell led to the classroom wings on the right and the gym straight ahead.  There were no visible people although I could hear noise from the direction of the gym. I am dressed in Wrangler jeans, a black Wrangler western shirt, black boots and a black Stetson hat. I would stand out in any American school outside of Texas.  Security would probably want to fingerprint me. In America, I know my driver’s license would be being run through a scanner. I would be explaining my purpose for being there and whom I was visiting. It was at this moment I realized my passport was in my pack at work, so I had no ID that any Armenian authority would understand. A Colorado Driver’s License does not hold much sway here.  I suddenly thought that I do not even know the teacher’s last name. I had my cell phone so when I got arrested, I would be able to call my friend Narine and ask her to send someone to get me out of jail.  How does bail work in Armenia?

A large man in camouflage came towards me and I saw the Armenian word for police above his right breast pocket.  He asked me something about what I was looking for and I explained as best as I could in my two-year-old child Armenian knowledge that I was there to meet with the English teacher.  He told me to stay and that he would go talk to her.  A few minutes later he was back and told me to wait fifteen minutes.  In Armenian that can mean anywhere between five minutes and an hour I have learned. I sat down on the nice benches in the corridor and began reading The Washington Post on my phone.

I had been there about five minutes when my phone rang displaying a different number than the teacher had used before, but I thought it might be her.  I usually don’t answer random numbers in Armenia or America.  In America, I let them go to voicemail. If it’s someone I want to talk to, I will return the call.  There is no voicemail here so I either answer or wait for a return call to decide.  I answered the phone and it was Hripsime, the teacher. She asked me where I was.  I told he just inside the front doors.  She told me to go outside and look for her.

As a guest, I dutifully walked out the front doors looking around for the teacher. I went down the front steps with my phone by my ear because she had not disconnected. I expected directions. I went from one side of the school to the other and saw no one.  I began to panic that maybe there was another school of which I was unaware.  I spoke on the phone to no answer. As my panic built, I suddenly heard a voice.  Back at the top of the stairs, by the door I had just exited was a young woman student beckoning me to come with her.  As I got to the top of the stairs, she told me her English was not good but follow her. I was a little confused having been told to go outside to look for the teacher and now I was being directed back to where I had just left.  I was experiencing the Armenian version of time and Google maps.

We walked down the hall in virtual silence and up the stairs to Hripsime’s classroom.  We walked in and all the students jumped from their seats and stood at respectful attention.  I had experienced this Soviet tradition when I had visited elementary classrooms with a principal to see the condition of the desks.  Hripsime introduced herself formally and I was glad to put a face to the voice with whom I had communicated.  She was a young woman in her thirties I would guess, dressed more casually than the older female teachers but still professionally.  I had noticed this phenomenon in Ayntap as well in the schools in America. I asked her to have the students return to their seats.  They watched with fascination as I strolled to the back of the room to place my cowboy hat and blue jean jacket on an empty desk in the back of the room.

When I returned to the front of the room to ask Hripsime what she wanted from me, she immediately began telling me how she had contacted Peace Corps many times to request a TEFL (Teacher of English as a Foreign Language) volunteer to come to her class in Noyemberyan.   She said she was told that the Peace Corps feared for the safety of volunteers because of the close proximity to the Azerbaijan border.  She asked me why Peace Corps had approved me coming here to work for community development. She did not laugh when I jokingly said that I was so old the Peace Corps felt if I got shot no one would notice. I thought it was funny, but I guess my dark and dry American humor does not work in Armenia.

She asked me if I would just tell her students a few things about myself, so they could hear a native speaker.  I saw one of my co-worker Ruzan’s students and knew she was studying English but did not understand me most of the time.  I told them I was a retired teacher and coach that had also worked in politics.  I asked if they had questions for me.  I had not seen so many blank stares coming from students since the day I told my students back home that I was retiring and going to Armenia.  Luckily the bell rang, and they scurried away as students will do all over the world.

Hripsime and I went to what I believe was a teacher’s lounge. This was where a culture shock beyond all belief occurred for me. The teachers were all gathering. I could sense the teachers who were senior and more powerful. I think I have been in too many teacher’s lounges in my life, the evidence of authoritarian nature and leadership was easily determined. That part was very familiar. Hripsime had an attendance book similar to a gradebook in America. I saw her open and make some marks and all the ladies were acting similarly. All of a sudden, they began passing the books around in some sort of order that I did not readily understand.  In American schools, gradebooks are legal documents used in courtrooms as evidence.  I once earned my school an additional $20,000 in funding because of the accuracy of my gradebook.  Seeing teachers release and exchange gradebooks was mind blowing for me.  I never asked for an explanation because my question would probably have confused them, and they worked like a well-oiled machine in their exchange.  Who am I to question?

Hripsime and I began planning for her next class. Shea asked me if I would read one of their assignments to them.  They had already read it but it would be good for them to hear a native speaker.  I wanted to look at the text but she introduced me to another teacher who spoke a little English and disappeared in the hallway.  The other teacher and I struggled through a brief conversation with me explaining in Armenian that I would live here for two years and she tried to get a point across to me that I never understood. I equate my limited Armenian understanding with talking to my now deaf mother, two very intelligent people, well at least my mom is, trying to have a conversation but frustratingly struggling to understand each other.  I walked out to the hall and saw four of the students who attend my English Club, Anna, Ani, Levon, and Artyom. They laughed and were happy to see me and Hripsime walked up and told me they were her students as well. We then went in opposite directions. I guess she meant they used to be her students.

We entered the next class and the students all stood.  My American students would die if they saw that.  She introduced me, and one young man said he knew me.  I recognized him as one of the many young men who have photobombed me while I played the guitar in the little park in the middle of town. I immediately threw the ever-present baseball I keep in my coat to him.  He caught it with a very confused look and told me he played football.  I think it shocked Hripsime as well.  He tossed me back the ball with a smile.

Hripsime asked the students to tell me their name and their hobby. We went from student to student.  I was amazed at how disrespectful the young man to whom I had thrown the ball was when the girls were speaking and there were four boys in the back of the room who never ceased talking.  Hripsime just kept going so, I said nothing.

As the students progressed I heard about liking to watch films, singing, reading, playing sports.  One young lady stood out to me, probably because of my background.  She told me she loved to draw and I could see she had physical challenges.  Her face had a feature and her fingers looked fused on her hands.  She had a wonderful smile and I asked if she would share some of her work on my next visit.  I asked the boy in the middle who was still talking and interrupting what he liked to do besides drive his teacher crazy.  Hripsime looked at me very confused and one of the girls translated what I said to the boy.  He laughed but it was my way of putting him on notice.  It was a behavioral method that worked in America, In Armenia, not so much. He told me about sports.  One of the other talkative boys told me had been driving a car since he was eleven years old.  He asked if I could drive so I showed him a picture of my truck and motorcycle back in America.  He was impressed, and all the other boys rushed over to see the pictures. A girl on the right side of the room told me she liked to draw as well and showed me a picture she drawn of me talking to them.  The drawing was very good although the subject matter was questionable.  I struggled through all of the students and then Hripsime selected a text for me to read.

As I read the text, she stopped me several times to ask the students to listen closely to my pronunciation.  I assumed it was a little different from the way they had pronounced words.  They seemed so ordinary that now I do not remember specifics.  The four boys in the back of the room continued talking and doing other work. If they heard a word I read, I would be shocked. Their behavior did not bother Hripsime nearly as much as it did me. Again, I held my thoughts to myself.

Class finished, and I told Hripsime that I needed to go to work. She asked if I would consider visiting her class weekly to read text to them. I told her that I would be honored if we could get it scheduled. She left for her next class and I left for work.  I was cooking Red Beans and Rice for my team, so I had work to do.  A little later in the day, Hripsime called me and asked if I liked her students.  I could hear the chatter of students behind her but assured her that I enjoyed the class and hoped they had liked me.  She said they had very much and wanted me to come back.  We decided that I would visit on Saturday in two weeks.

I wish I knew Armenian better, but the goal is for them to learn English. I will keep struggling to be able to communicate with them as they learn English.  I would love to just sit in some classrooms and observe teaching.  I think it would help me understand their education system better.  I can recognize good teaching without understanding the vocabulary around me.  I have proven that by sitting in a Chinese language teacher’s class as well as my friend John’s advanced mathematics class called Differentiated Equations. I don’t even understand the title of John’s class but I can easily tell what great teachers they both are. I believe Hripsime is a good teacher and I want to help her anyway I can.  I look forward to my return to Noyemberyan High School.