Friday, July 08, 2005
Missing My Students
In Egypt I was a music teacher. This was quite a challenge at first, but it became a passion, and a cause for me. Most kids in Egypt don't get much of an education in the arts (in any form) and the parents for the most part don't encourage it. There are the exceptions, the ones that place their children into music lessons or art classes, but these are expensive, and most parents are more apt to encourage the academic side of a child rather than his or her artistic side. Therefore, most of my older students came into class with the attitude that this would be an "easy" class, just as American students do, and that they would be allowed to do whatever they wished in class without my disciplining them, as many of the music classes do in Egyptian schools. But, I am not an Egyptian music teacher! I had a plan that I followed "religiously" which included theory and history, and since we didn't have proper instruments, each student had to learn the fine art of singing. These children didn't know what hit them! Each grade was assigned two classes a week of music, and because the classes were extremely small, I combined certain grades, which was also necessary as I taught Kindergarten all the way up to 11th grade (with a couple 12th graders thrown in).
It was my responsibility to plan and oversee two major shows a year, which were just that--major. The success of the school depended on these shows according to the headmistress, a catty, evil woman that reminded me of a nazi bulldozer! (This was the contradiction...the parents didn't care enough about music to encourage their children in it, but they expected a Las Vegas styled "party" to show it off!) The closer we got to "showtime", the shorter my nails became.
This last show, the photo above, was quite successful, and really made me very proud of my students. They worked very hard on every little detail, and despite the rigors of the training, ended up making this show memorable. The art teacher worked closely with me and drew up plans for a beautiful set that represented our winter theme, and the students carried out her direction to create it. They were quite proud of their accomplishments, and proved once again Egyptian ingenuity. Other teachers pulled together "Christmasy" skits based mainly on old American children's Christmas songs. The students that wouldn't buckle down during the beginning of this school year realized their musical potential, and were quite pleased with themselves when we were able to sing some popular songs in a professional manner. The hardest part of all was getting them to remember to "line up" properly, in order to file onto the stage in the correct order, but they pulled it off without a hitch and looked beautiful in their black, white and red "uniforms". For an hour and a half, these dedicated students, transformed themselves into singers and actors, putting on a show that will be hard to duplicate in the future.
Unfortunately, This show was the last time I saw my students. We came to America during the vacation, and a new music teacher was hired. She doesn't teach them theory or history, and from the letters I receive from my students, she isn't teaching them singing, either. She has taken them back to where they were before I came two years ago, and all of the work that I had so meticulously put together for the future of the school has been ignored. It's no wonder Egyptian children don't know how to sing.
I will never forget the names or the faces of these kids, and I hope that somehow I have planted a seed of music appreciation inside their precious hearts that will grow and reseed in the next generation. I pray that these kids can carry on what I taught them about music and singing, and that they always remember what I told them, "You are the music while the music lasts..." E.E. Cummings.
