Piled Higher and Deeper

Cockface (of force feed apple distress fame) decided to whack the irritation knob up to 11 this afternoon when she attempted to 'pull rank' on me by claiming the classroom I was using was in fact hers despite the fact that before I scheduled my classes to this room (after arranging for it for it to be furnished with chairs and a desk), it had not once been used since the university opened four years ago. Whining and moaning about a bit of paper that had been signed by someone more important than me claiming the room as hers, I promptly lost my cool a little by banging my head off the wall and telling her that I couldn't care less who signed what and that no amount of paper waggling or squeaking was going to make me shift twenty students who were waiting patiently for me to begin the lesson. She took her group of seven to the empty classroom opposite where after whatever it is she teaches (English supposedly, in a world where perfect recitation of grammar rules evidently foregoes the need for any formal training), she promptly trotted off to whine to Mr Boss, completely unaware that as well as thinking I'm the best thing since sliced bread he also finds her mind-bogglingly irritating and pretty much told her to shut up and sod off. I feel a wee bit sorry for her in that she is obviously a bit miffed at losing what little control she previously had over things, but she is such an annoying tit that it serves her right.

She is almost as irritating as Syllablechops from Oman, and that's saying something.

In other news, one of the other teachers whom I originally thought was pretty decent is starting to develop rather worrying not-right-in-the-heid behaviour. She didn't like one of the rooms she was allocated on her timetable so asked me if she could move. I said it wasn't a problem whatsoever providing that she informed the students of the change so they knew where to go (a simple task of waiting in the designated room for them to arrive, and then moving to the other room pied-piper style). What she actually did was ask a security guard to tell any students who arrived in the old room where their new room was before turning up twenty-five minutes late to the new room where any students that did manage to get the message has disappeared after assuming that a room with no teacher probably wasn't the correct room. She repeated this with another two classes.

It gets better.

She then came to me and complained that the timetable was clearly incorrect as when she turns up to class, there never seem to be any students.

Erm, hello?

My suggestion that Mr Boss scouted potentially decent teachers by popping along to the British Council and grabbing the new CELTA trainees (the course that I did when I first moved to Oman) has immediately paid off as today we interviewed a very nice American girl who has just passed the course and is looking for work. I spent quite a bit of time with her making sure she knew what she was letting herself in for and hope I gave just the right amount of honesty so as not to scare her off, but enough that she won't feel like she's been 'had' when she starts, which will hopefully be next week. After all the nonsense from my Egyptian colleagues, it was nice to have a positive development today. We're interviewing another CELTA trainee tomorrow; the new teachers will be helping to reduce class sizes and also lift my teaching load so I can concentrate on how on earth we're going to teach an extra five-hundred students in a couple of months time.

I must admit, I'm enjoying being in control and being trusted to get stuff done. It would be nice to not have such useless plebs around me, but perhaps I wouldn't be headed towards a potential Assistant Director of Studies role if I didn't.