Blindly, I walked into the teacher's room. I do this everyday...walk with purpose through the door, find a surface to place my things on and sit at a computer pretending to be awake, while I wait for my all too infrequent classes to begin. I had my earphones in, as I often do, listening to radio or music. I think on this occasion it was music, Jazz, Emilie-Claire Barlow. Keep in mind that it is 7:30 in the morning and it has been six years since I've made a habit out of rising early. Something seemed amiss this morning. A certain frantic milling about the computers just down the line from me, but I was too immersed in trying to look busy to pay it any mind. The other teachers often erupt into some frenzy that I do not understand. I blame the language and cultural barriers, but it is probably just my anti-social nature. I paid them no mind and was on my way to teach a class.
I returned about two hours later after I had done some supervision and taught the class. Now, slightly more awake, I notice that, despite the reduced population in the room, there is still an uneasy buzz and a general looking-around. Not seriously bothered, I continue my reclusive behaviour at a computer, this time without the earphones. I do some marking and pick away at a lesson plan. My ears are always busy, listening to the sounds around me, so work happens very slowly in this room where sounds are everywhere. To my right I pick up the Puerto Rican delegate asking one of the American teachers if he knew anything about the bag of candies and coins on the shelf. All the English-as-a-first-language folks had been left out so far, but Robert decided that it was time to widen the circle of interview.
"Everybody's freaking out", says my Puerto Rican friend, "they think it is some sort of curse, or something, you know the candied corn, money, and little beans. One of the ladies picked it up this morning and wanted to eat a candy, but there was all these coins mixed in with it, so she thought it was some sort of voodoo. Then we were searching online, because the plastic bag was green. Man, Dominicans are so superstitious."
I get a sinking feeling that only a new teacher in a foreign culture can get when there has been a strange misunderstanding. This was my bag of voodoo, only, it wasn't voodoo, it was the playing pieces for my own simplified version of Settlers of Catan, that I was playing in class to teach my kids about trading in the Ghana Empire. I told Robert what it was, in English, and he says: "watch this". He goes over to the shelf and picks it up (not afraid of the curse any more) and starts parading it around the room, threatening to drop it on the desks. He has his laugh and then announces what it is. In my broken Spanish, I confirm his tale as true and for the rest of the day everyone who walks into the staff room is greeted with "did you hear, we found the witch!"