Boiling Teeth

Thursday, 5 July 2018

It’s not so easy to do homework.

It’s not so easy, getting up at 4 AM – saying morning prayers, sweeping the house and yard of leaves and sand, walking as far as I have to with an empty bucket and returning balancing one full of water on my head, repeating that, repeating that again, bathing and eating, and putting on my uniform – to find a pen somewhere around the house so that I can write at school.

It’s not so easy, arriving at school – sweeping the classrooms, fetching water for the teachers, and cutting the grass – to find time to copy the assignment from my friends.

It’s not so easy, sitting in class – waiting for Isaac to finish using the pen I lent him, squirming in the uncomfortable desks, avoiding the harsh gaze of my teacher, and trying to follow the Science lecture given in English, my second language – to understand today’s lesson.

It’s not so easy, coming home from school – running errands to the market, helping with the cooking and the cleaning and the laundry, enduring a sharp smack here and there when I make a mistake or get caught idle, eating, bathing, and cleaning – to remember that I need to pull out my notes and push through my exhaustion a little bit longer before I can sleep or even just stare at the wall.

It was a short assignment to grade this morning.

List 2 physical changes and 2 chemical changes.

On the scarred wooden table serving as a teacher’s desk was a stack of homework notebooks. Beaten up, missing pages, perpetually damp with humidity, each notebook was open to the homework assignment I was grading. I started with the top of the stack.

1. Boiling water. Brushing teeth.
2. Digestion of food. Liting a match.

I corrected the spelling error and gave it a 4/4. Next one.

1. Boiling water. Tering paper.
2. Digestion of food. Liting a match.

Good.

1. Boiling teeth. Tering paper.
2. Digestion of food. Liting a match.

Boiling teeth. I thought about it. Clearly the student was trying to copy someone else’s answer and mixed up “boiling water” and “brushing teeth”. But it was technically a physical change, as long as the boiling water just heats the teeth. 4/4. Next notebook.

1. Boiling teeth. Tering paper.
2. Digestion of food. Liting a match.

It would have to be a review day.