Myriad Ways

The Voice of Crow

"Kaok kaok..." said Mr. Teacher while stretching his both hands and moving those up and down.

We -kindergarten students- imitated his motion while imagining to be a flying crow.

Mr. Teacher was my temporary teacher. He came sometimes. When my fixed teacher was on duty, he came to replace. He taught at another kindergarten usually. I did not know, wether they shared their teaching task or something else. But he lived not far from my house.

People said that Mr.Teacher when at home liked making up as the way woman does. He put some things on his face: face powder, lipstick, eye shadow, etc. At school, he held his dignity, behave as good as he could to be a male teacher.

Some naughty boys that far older than me often called him on the road, "Sissy! Sissy!"

Nevertheless Mr. Teacher did not reply. If he became sad or angry, what he would do was only crying silently.

Mr. Teacher had ever played a tradisional drama, an event of the village. There, on the stage, I saw him wearing costume and make-up like woman and behave feminine. That was after I had graduated from the kindergarten.

To have a role as woman made Mr. Teacher like playing drama, but this stood not long. The people in the drama group bullied him when he performed in another village.

There was a scene of slapping and he was slapped seriously continuously. Soon he went home, again crying.

Mr. Teacher had ever had a boyfriend, short in time. It turned out that the guy was a deceiver. He was left after this guy took all his money. His heart was broken into pieces.

After all those problems, he never gets revenge to the persons who have bullied him orally or physically, even the deceiver.

Some people are bad and evil, but many more people are kind to him, defend him, become his friends and his students respect him, because he is a very kind person, full of compassion, and a good teacher. Most of us accept him.

Now he has retired and doesn't marry anybody.

Let me tell you about why we -his students- call him Mr. Teacher.

'Mr. Teacher' in original version is 'Pak Guru'.

Teacher isn't a name. It is an honor calling. We never call him by his name, but by his profession. This is common in our culture, Indonesia.

Another example of honor calling is that we call a police officer just by,

"Mr. Police! Mrs. Police!" in original version, 'Pak polisi' and 'Bu polisi'.

This is our way of calling. What about yours?