Boys Will Be Boys

Dearly Beloved,

We are gathered here today to reminisce about our childhood follies that filled the day with carefree nonchalance leading us hither and thither through sun-soaked streets and fields and the occasional mud puddle. And to pay homage to our mothers for washing our mudcaked pants by hand because our shoes are in the washing machine since we didn't even have galoshes on. And because after we excitedly shoved our feet in the sparkling clean sneakers she had carefully placed on a piece of railing where the cats wouldn't crap in them that also got the last drop of sun, we immediately noticed something was oh so wrong with our favorite footwear. All the nooks and crannies and little crevices our toes instinctively sought out as sanctuary from all the scary critters dwelling in the grass were gone! Replaced by calloused lizard skin groping the bottoms of our feet. And we somehow found her at fault. As if she were to blame for our calloused soles. The mud felt just fine, we didn't mind the mud. We coulda just walked it off in the sunshine, but oohhh, noooo, she had to go wash our shoes. We always knew there was something sordid about this insistent washing business. Like it's really necessary to wash our bodies AND our clothes. And now we had evidence. So we paraded this evidence around the (court)house held high above our heads with indignance in our eyes as we declared at the top of our lungs, "I'm never wearing shoes again."

This is for our mothers who managed not to kill us during childhood.

Working at an all-boys high school reminds me almost daily of what I was like as a young boy. All the zits and B.O., raging hormones and senseless violence; it's not a pretty picture. It is, however, hack-up-a-lung-hilarious sometimes.

While teaching a lesson on the conditional tense, I distributed little slips of paper to small groups of about four students each. Written on the little slips of paper were various second conditional statements, such as, "If I were invisible," or, "If aliens landed on Earth." The small groups were assigned the task of writing at least four possible results to complete the condition. For example, "If I were invisible, I would play jokes on my friends," or "If aliens landed on Earth, I would steal their technology." One of the conditions read, "If I could control the weather," and one student completed it with, "I would strike lightening at North Korea at random, killing people. KOREA MUST BE UNITED!" While this is certainly first prize, there were a few honorable mentions:

"If aliens landed on Earth, I would make a baby."

"If I were the President of Korea, I would kill all the prisoners."

"If I were invisible, I would kidnap Sun-Ye [a Korean pop star]."

"If I had Superman's powers, I would kill Invisible Man and take Sun-Ye to motel."

Around 90% of the rest of the answers involved destroying the school or making girlfriends.

During a supplementary lesson that meets only once a month, we were practicing simple phrases to eliminate grammatical concerns and focus on speed and accuracy with pronunciation. Brainstorming nouns for, "I like ________," one student shouts "Sun-dae!" to the uproarious laughter of the class. I assumed this was a girl's name, so I wrote it on the board in Korean (순대) to the utter amazement of my students. After a few more sentences, we arrived at, "I have _________," whereupon the same student shouted even louder, "SUN-DAE!!" The class turned into a zoo of hysterical hyenas. I assumed he meant she was his girlfriend, so I asked, "Who is Sun-Dae?"

"No, teacher. Not person. Korean sausage."

Then I remembered having tried a spicy sausage I believed could have been this sun-dae, so I said, "Oooh, yeah! I like sun-dae"

Five kids actually fell out of their chairs laughing.

One student, through gasps, said, "I have BIG sun-dae," while gesturing with his hands as if he were telling a story about catching a fish.

It clicked. They weren't talking about kosher sausage.

Quickly changing subjects, I asked another student what else he might have, leading with suggestions of a phone or an mp3 player. He shouted, "I have a Coke!" Relieved to have regained neutrality, I rushed to write Coke on the board. He said, "No, teacher, not 'Coke,' Coke!"

"Spell it," I said.

"C-O-C-K, Coke!"

Boys will be boys the world round.


"Reading good books implants good ideas in the mind, develops good aspirations, and leads to the cultivation of good friends." ~Mas Oyama~