A Year in A Life: IFS

She had SO many questions. The questions went on and on for what seemed like forever. I should have realized then that MS was going to be a handful as a supervisor, but I didn’t think anything of it at the time. I wanted to teach. If you’re a teacher, you’re used to the ridiculous amount of questions you’re asked. Some of the questions won’t even pertain to what you do. For instance, on the state test to become certified, they asked me about elementary classes when I’m not interested and will never teach elementary school. It was also about science, which I have nothing to do with as an English teacher. I’ve stated before, and I’ll state it again, that teachers go through crazy amounts of inspection to teach people’s children. I understand that we are entrusted with today’s youth, but it’s not in a dark alley somewhere. We’re always accountable every day all the time; people hear of teachers messing with students, but that’s because it’s a salacious story to report. Therefore, it seems common, but it’s not a common occurrence at all. I satisfied all of MS’s questions, and she let me know that I would have to come in and meet with a committee to answer more questions. Again, this is a common thing for teachers to interview while several people are in the room, including Board members, administrators, department heads, team leaders, other teachers, etc. Even students. I kind of like those interviews where students are asking me questions. They’re as nervous as I am and what a strange position to be put in: to have to evaluate an adult who wants to teach them.

It was a bright, hot day when I showed up at the Islamic Foundation School or IFS. It’s in a busy, older neighborhood West of Chicago. The neighborhood is crowded with middle-class homes, and to get to the school one has to do some fancy maneuvering through tightly packed streets. I was wearing a blouse and a skirt, with pantyhose and everything, carrying a portfolio with a pad and copies of my resume.

I was early, so I had to wait outside the office with lots of people milling around me. Concordia University, my alma mater, is a Christian university that makes its students study religion–9 hours worth (3 classes). One class I took was World Religion, and in this class, I studied Islam along with Judaism, Buddhism, and Christianity. I thought I was so worldly. Alas, no. There I was in a knee-length skirt at a mosque during their prayer service time. I couldn’t be more inappropriate until someone came up to me and asked me what I was doing there.

He was handsome and kind looking as he eyed me, this stranger in their midst who appeared wholly inappropriate and lost-looking, I’m sure. I stood up to talk to him, letting him know I was there to interview for a teaching position. Pure instinct led me to reach out my hand for a firm shake, something I would prefer as a greeting. He backed up quickly, a bit of shock stretching his features, as he held up his hands and quickly stated, “I can’t touch you.” I would learn that in the Muslim faith if a woman isn’t your relative or wife, you aren’t to touch her. Later, I would meet his lovely wife and their super-pretty, smart daughter. At that moment, I found out I was 0 for 2. The knee-length skirt is normally considered modest, but not at a mosque where no leg is to be shown. He spoke to me politely and tried to make me feel more comfortable, but I was in over my head.

MS was a handsome woman covered from the top of her head to her feet, with olive skin and a face stretched tightly over curvy bones. I liked her right away because she reminded me of the seriousness and strength of my mother (see Elfriede’s story in All About Me post 1). What bothered me was that I couldn’t read her at all. Very few people are closed to my ability to understand and feel for them. I’m a natural empath and can usually read things like mood, desires, emotions, etc. Usually, I can. There have been cases where I was caught off guard by someone’s emotions or desires, but it happens so rarely that it shocks me deeply when it does. With MS, the best I can say is that she looked “tight”, so stretched that she had no expression. Some people are not open with their emotions and have this affectless expression that goes beyond being tired or hopeless–it shows nothing. My mother I could read for the most part because I suppose I was close enough to her, but MS–it wasn’t good at first because her lack of feeling was a bit on the disconcerting side. However, like I said, I started out liking her earnestness and her dedication to the school.

The trailers or “portables” were at the back of the school. I decorated my part of the trailer and got ready for school to start. I was told that I didn’t have to wear a hijab, but I had to wear my medium-length hair up, no tight or revealing clothing, and no leg showing. They weren’t too hard on me, but they did make one Muslim teacher of European descent (she was Polish) put on a different covering because they felt her original one was too tight. I had seen it and it wasn’t that bad. However, the school’s standards were not my standards. I would learn this the hard way.

The Muslim faith, like any organized and culturally-based religion, has a myriad of ways to worship. Some organizations are more conservative than others. I would meet people at IFS who were very modern and worldly. I would also meet people who were super strict and didn’t want anything to do with a modern culture that wasn’t their own. The school was stuck in the middle of these views and opted towards the harshest of believers: no photos, birthdays, music, dancing, or touching of any kind. If a parent complained, a rule was made to appease that parent’s sensibilities, no matter how strict.

BTW

The trailer I was assigned to was divided into two parts: one for me and one for another teacher. This other teacher couldn’t stand me. I’m not sure why; I guess I made too much noise for her. She would complain about me and didn’t talk to me. I can think back now on the harsh looks some of the employees and mosque members gave me as I was on campus. They were decidedly unfriendly and never let me forget that I was an outsider. At the time, I didn’t care. I was there for the students.

I had MS’s daughter in my senior English class. I liked that she was softer, but she had the same determination as her mother. Like I’ve said, I admire this type of authoritative personality for the most part because my mother had the “bull in the china shop” drive most of the time, too. Still, MS was missing one thing that my mother had: heart. The passion came from her desire to be “perfect” in every respect, especially with her Muslim faith. So, we couldn’t celebrate birthdays and I was scolded dearly when the students threw me a surprise birthday party and I refused to punish them. I was told my behavior was discussed at the board meeting like that was supposed to scare me. I didn’t see how that was my fault since it was a surprise birthday party that their children initiated. If anyone should know that they aren’t allowed to celebrate, it would be their kids. It was my job to put the kids back into place and reprimand them severely for the birthday party. I couldn’t. It was done innocently and not as an affront to the faith.

When I played music (the noise!), I was reprimanded yet again. My classes rest heavily on discussions as we study literature, and I got in trouble for allowing the girls and boys in class to discuss together. On a side note, the boys were so mad that the girls were talking back to them. Sometimes the disagreements were hilarious because the boys had just never been talked back to in that sort of way by girls. And the girls were good at discussion and rhetoric. They knew how to handle the boys who figured their maleness was enough to dominate a discussion. They were wrong. Nonetheless, I had to learn and abide by the rules.

• the boys and girls could not sit together. The boys would be on one side of the classroom and the girls on the other. They were not to be close together and they definitely could not touch.
• the boys and girls could not speak to each other. My discussions, of course, became a problem, but I refused to back down from this and even MS had to realize that discussion was a necessary part of the class. Therefore, we compromised and they were allowed to talk in class, just not directly to each other. The comments had to be directed to “everyone” or myself, though they may be answering the opposite sex person in the class. This was awkward and just downright strange, but we made it work mostly by bending the rule.
• No birthday recognition, no music, no movies that were not approved, and no questionable material for them to read. I did break some of these rules a bit as I don’t tend to censor much. It was more like I bent them as I found ways to do what I wanted when I wanted.

I’m sure there were more rules that I blocked from memory. And to be fair to the boys, they were brought up to be the golden children of their families. I won’t say the girls weren’t valued because many of them were, but they were in a different league and the two were not competing. For instance, the boys had a uniform, but their uniforms had variety. They were able to wear slacks or shorts to school. The girls had one uniform. They had skirts down to the floor and button-up shirts with the hijab.

I shrugged nonchalantly. Yes, one girl did lift up her shirt and showed off her belly ring. It was only us girls, but this was apparently still considered obscene. Looking into MS’s tight, angry face (that emotion she showed well), I lied, “Well, maybe a bit of a stomach showed as she adjusted her skirt, but that was it.” The girls learned they could trust me and my room become the hangout for the girls who couldn’t take the pressure anymore of having to be perfect.

They were not allowed to pull up their skirt for any reason, including going upstairs. The trailer had stairs that girls tripped up many times thanks to the heavy plaid skirts they had that for some hit the ground. I was not allowed to change this rule even if it meant that some girls were injured. One girl stands out in my memory because I couldn’t help her thanks to the cultural prejudice that existed in that community. I had her and her sister in the same class (I believe the older girl was held back for reasons never disclosed or not remembered). The older sister had a body tremor, a pronounced one, that caught my eye quickly. Her head would move involuntarily for large stretches of time. She would have trouble walking, some days more than others. It would kill me to see her try to navigate with that long skirt and the stairs. More than once she tripped up into my trailer, once really hurting herself. I quietly told her to pick up her skirt if she needed, just don’t go past her ankles, but it was easy to get caught doing this.

I went to MS with my concerns about the girl’s body tremors (they were more than tics) and expressed that there had to be something serious, something neurologically wrong to interfere with walking and causing her head to shake constantly. There were times it was hard for her to speak. I was told to mind my own business as the family is a good Muslim family and don’t want the doctors to label their child with any type of disease. She was not allowed to lift her skirt and they didn’t check into her medical issues. I felt helpless. But not always.

The high school gathered for morning announcements in the biggest space they had–the basement. We would sit together and hear any news we needed and then pray. I loved to watch the prayer and participated sometimes with open hands pointed towards the clouds. The humbleness of the lowered chin and the exposed, vulnerable palms of one’s hands always made me feel warm and happy. All of these souls with one, single mission and show of absolute love and faith. I didn’t always go to the meetings as sometimes I stayed in my classroom and used the extra, quiet time for preparation or just my sanity. What started to happen was some of the girls would stay with me in the room, telling MS that they were sick or whatever to be allowed to stay there. One day, one of the girls came limping into the room and told me that when she stood up after the meeting, something snapped in her knee. I tried to look at her knee, but she had all of those layers on! When I felt her knee, it was seriously deformed. The plate that sits on top was off to the side.

I asked her to call her mother and have her mother take her to the emergency room immediately. She didn’t have a phone and now she was shy about going to the office since they didn’t treat her very well the first time, so I pulled out my cell phone and told her to call her mother and have her come get her now. Later, I found out the girl’s knee cap had become displaced and if she had continued to walk on it, she would have crippled herself. I couldn’t help but think that I had helped her despite the school. It was a strange victory over MS and the powers that be at IFS. I wished I didn’t feel like an adversary, but that’s what it turned into.

It was me versus MS. That first year, she demanded that I move inside the school, close to her office. I didn’t mind leaving the trailer, but I definitely felt it was for the wrong reasons. I moved inside like she asked. Whenever the students needed something, they came to me for help. There were things I could help them with and some things I couldn’t. For example, I had this sweet girl in my class whose younger brother also went to this school. She and her friends were in the hall by her locker when her little brother came up to say hi to her. The girl was suspended for this contact with a boy (her brother wasn’t, though). Remember the rule? Girls can’t talk to the boys, even if they’re siblings. Her brother was in elementary school and it was her BROTHER so I didn’t think it was harmful in any way. I begged MS not to suspend the girl, but she wouldn’t listen to me.

The seniors were going on a field trip and they were so excited. That is until the girls found out that they weren’t invited. The school felt it was too tricky to take the girls off-campus. That was it for me. I demanded that MS take the girls or cancel the trip altogether. We compromised and the boys went on their trip and the girls had their own separate trip. Fine. I thought for sure I would end up on the girl’s trip, but she sent me with the boys. I still had a great time. I remember that one of the games at the pizza place we went to had an actress from Star Trek on it wearing one of the form-fitting outfits that the future seemed to hold for us mere mortals. All of her curves showed and I was so embarrassed for these boys who normally get no interaction with girls. Or at least they’re not supposed to.

Some other crazy stories:

• When one goes into the women’s bathroom, there are what look like watering cans with super long necks beside the toilets. I remember being very confused. There were also low troughs by the sinks. I later learned that during a woman’s period, the blood is considered unclean and shouldn’t be touched, so they have to use the watering can to clean themselves. Also, for prayer, your hands and feet have to be clean. So, the trough is used to clean one’s feet easily.
• If a girl was on her period, she was not allowed in the mosque. They had to put the students somewhere during prayer, so I ended up keeping them in my room and we would talk, eat, watch movies, etc. MS grew angry again as the girls would gather in my room during prayers. That’s when I realized that girls would be on their periods for weeks, skipping prayers to stay in my room. I felt bad about that, but that was not something I was going to police. Once, we were watching a movie happily, the math teacher with me, too, and MS came storming in and demanded to know what was going on. I didn’t even look away from the movie when I said, “We’re watching a movie.” I guess she wasn’t expecting this type of reply because she just stood there stewing for a minute and then stayed for a while. I don’t know what she thought we were doing, but it was free time and the movie was okay to show. We just wanted to socialize for a while.
• The school banned Harry Potter books because of witchcraft. I believe they did finally allow students to read it as long as parents were okay with it. I tried to find a movie for all of us to watch together and Finding Nemo was banned because the fish didn’t wear clothes. (Sigh) You can’t make this stuff up.
• Please discipline small children to help them understand they shouldn’t be rude to adults. I was sitting on the steps to my trailer one day, doing nothing, really, when a mother and her small child (maybe 3 years old) came walking by. As adults, we greeted each other nicely, but the little girl started shouting at me to get out of here. The child was screaming at me to leave! I remember looking horrified and I looked to the parent to explain to the little girl that I was where I was supposed to be and that she shouldn’t command an adult, but the mother only laughed and stated how cute her daughter was. She watched as her daughter demanded I get out of there and leave them alone. I just sat there, stunned. It wasn’t cute; it was just plain rude. Every other time she saw me on campus, she yelled at me the same way and the mother always laughed. I never did.
• Relationships were common though they were punished greatly if found out (at least the girls were). The boys were not blamed; the wayward girls threatened their innocence, I suppose. I had a blind spot right behind my room (my room had a back door that lead outside for some odd reason) and every once and a while a couple would go back there to be alone. They weren’t doing anything terrible, I know for sure, but they weren’t supposed to be alone together period at the school. This blind spot was the only place where prying eyes couldn’t catch them. Otherwise, my room was watched from the windows outback and the hallway windows. The computer teacher’s sweet daughter was in a relationship with one of the most prized sons. She looked like a human doll with fine, porcelain features and he was very handsome from a rich family. I tried to help them keep the secret, but it was found out whether I could help it or not. The harassment started immediately as this boy’s family did NOT want her near their precious lad. The school accused her of having an older boyfriend that would pick her up. That was her brother and her parents’ confirmed it. Of course, there was a problem with her knee. Her mother was let go in the middle of the year. The boy faced no issues.
• Be careful what you wish for…sometimes it doesn’t end the way you think it would. The girls were not allowed near the boys or to have romantic relationships. What transpired then that blew us all away? The girls started being touchy-feely with each other. They weren’t breaking any rules since it was the same sex, but it was obvious that they were experimenting and seeking some type of physical solace. They would lay on each other, hold each other, and be on each other’s laps. It could get steamy and weird, really. Even I was taken aback and not much shocks me. It would be different if the activity was gay, but it wasn’t. They were just finding comfort in each other and it would turn intimate quickly. Maybe it was some strange byproduct of the girls not being able to express themselves with boys? I don’t know.

• The science fair was rigged. Who rigs a middle and high school science fair? They did. The science teacher came to me almost crying as MS was beginning to harass her by sitting in her class all of the time and yelling at her openly in front of students. The science teacher had put together a fair for middle and high school students and the school insisted on certain students winning. She didn’t want to cheat for them, but they awarded the prizes that they wanted to anyway and then harrassed the poor woman for the rest of the year. I give her props for hanging in there.
• A group of girls was accused of cheating on the standardized test and were forced to retest though there was no proof they cheated. They searched the girls before they took the test, but still said they must have cheated because the results were so similar. They came crying to me for help, and I tried to explain that they had studied the same materials together and that’s probably why the results were so similar. I had helped them find the resources to study so I knew what happened. It didn’t matter, they were branded as cheaters and had to take the test again after being searched and sitting far apart. Of course, the outcome was the same.
• The Principal. Let me just say this: he started off the year speaking to the entire school, from pre-K to seniors. How did he do this? Powerpoint. I love a good Powerpoint, but the 3-year-olds didn’t. I never understood why he would insist on speaking for so long with a Powerpoint the little ones couldn’t even read! He did my evaluation and came into the speech class. The class and I discussed the next speech they were going to do and I thought it was a great conversation with good feedback. I ended up with low scores and I was shocked. Apparently, he didn’t like that I didn’t lecture. He preached lectures and simple memorization. I was not that kind of teacher. That’s why the math teachers scored so high, and the teachers like myself were left to the wind and told to shape up and stop the frivolity.

The things I still think about the most are the students and MS. I worked at IFS after 9-11 and it would’ve been easy to look at the students, teachers, parents, etc. as something that is foreign. But they weren’t. I loved the girls and boys and I would fiercely protect them if someone tried to say anything about them. I didn’t have the same political views all of the time, but that didn’t bother me. It bothered some of them that I wouldn’t say anything against Israel. These were the adults, though. With their children, it was much simpler.

MS once took me aside after a lesson she observed on poetry and asked me not to talk about Islam. I admit that I was hurt by this; all I said was that the Koran was poetry and some of the most beautiful in the world. How could this be bad in any way? I must admit that the kids were sheltered, though. I had taken the girls to see a performance on stage and they were terrified of the differently-abled people that also attended. I didn’t blame them because they should be more exposed to how the world really is as we are all different.

And MS. The principal job became vacant for the following year and I thought for sure she would take it. When she didn’t, I heard it was because she wanted it too much and that was a sin. That always bothered me. Not that I necessarily thought she’d be a great principal, but I thought she would deserve it if she worked hard enough for the school. They did get a woman in the job so it wasn’t so much sex discrimination, but I always felt she should have gotten a chance. Maybe this is strange to say since I ended up leaving because of her. When the principal said he would renew my contract for the following year, I said only if MS isn’t an administrator. He said she would be (of course), so I left the school after only a year. It wasn’t that I hated MS, quite the opposite. I just didn’t agree with how she ran things. It’s not for me to say it’s wrong, but I will say there were things that went against my own code of ethics. In the end, I was true to myself.