The gift that keeps on giving

Throughout the 2014 movie "Fury" about a heroic World War II tank commander (played by Brad Pitt) and his devoted crew, the men each say "Best job I ever had" ironically as they face an ever-insurmountable enemy attack.

But in a way, their love for one another and the cause DOES make it the best job they've ever had.

And so it is for me with teaching English to now thousands of adult learners from hundreds of countries, both in the classroom and more recently online (due to the pandemic and closed international borders).

It's draining, the pay is awful and the extra, unpaid hours spent counselling, marking and preparing for classes are gruelling and sometimes sap every ounce of energy and enthusiasm I have left in my now-ageing body.

But the rewards far outweigh those downsides a thousand-fold, especially the "Eureka moment" when students "get it" and are able to use the language right back at you.

I use a lot of humor in my classes, describing English as like your "crazy old auntie" who doesn't always make sense but is full of wonderful stories which are always worth listening to.

I explain that English is also like "a big greedy monster" which devours (incorporates) words from at least 17 other languages and which is reluctant to eat any more so "recycles" existing words through adding prefixes and suffixes.

I explain these are like Lego or Minecraft blocks snapped on to the front and back of a root word. They get that.

Those "Eureka moments" are when you chat to a former student as naturally as you would another native speaker, cracking jokes, using idioms, nuances, effectively forgetting that they were ever even a student.

Or that student who is tickled pink when you translate a piece of slang that they were too embarrassed to ask about at work.

As an example, an Advanced English student who was working as a painter's apprentice, sidled up to me one night after class and said: "Teacher, what's a 'thingy' because my boss is always asking me to get him the thingy that does this or the thingy that does that."

Of course I explained that a "thingy" was a wonderful word for anything which we could not remember its name or did not have time to say its name.

My student laughed with sheer delight. When he graduated at the top of the Cambridge Advanced English class, he whispered to me that after 9 months of intense study, "thingy" was still his all-time favorite English word!

Bless him. Students come and go but a handful will always stand out in my mind. A Brazilian who sold his hair to pay for his flight to Australia. Yes, young Brazilian men grow their virgin hair long then sell it. He came from the very poorest favela of Rio de Janeiro and arrived in Australia speaking zero English. He graduated 18 months later, speaking fluent English and gaining Permanent Residency (or "PR" as they call it) and lives and works in Brisbane now.

My online student from South Korea who now works as a hotel manager in St Moritz, another Brazilian who I helped fill out the forms to become a crane driver on major construction projects, a Colombian who fulfilled his dream of becoming a commercial pilot, a Turk who now owns 2 kebab shops in my city, a Russian who is now a rap dancer in Canada.

Dear Karen from Mexico who returned home to get married and then couldn't because of covid. Her favorite English expression was "raining cats and dogs"; Lucas, who returned to Brazil and asks me to help him with writing cards and letters to his girlfriend in English; and John, who adores Aussie slang and sends me funny Tik Tok videos about how weird my native tongue is.

As an example, Australians love to answer in the negative. By way of illustration, to the question: "How are you?" the answer is "Not bad". Similarly to the question: "Where is it?" the answer is "Not far". To the question: "What did it cost?" the reply "Not much". Hilarious really. He's teaching me about my language because as a native speaker, it often takes a learner to open your eyes to idiosyncrasies.

I am close to 60 now and of all the jobs I have done, this one is far and away the most fascinating and meaningful. I love my language and obviously I'm passionate about writing and being able to share that is a joy and a gift that really does keep on giving.