The Jewish Santa

I bet you think it is easy dressing up as Santa and trying to get crying babies to sit nicely in your lap so that their Japanese mothers can take their obligatory picture. How hard can it be just sitting there and smiling you ask?

Have a look at the pictures of me starting out with the long underwear, putting on multiple layers of clothing and then finally putting on a beard and hat- I am the one who should be crying! Try smiling at the same time as you are constantly adjusting your beard and making sure your hat stays on, all in forty degree heat!

When the management of my apartment asked me when we were going away for the holidays, I told them the 22 of December. Good they said, we will make the Christmas party the 21st so I could be Santa Claus. How hard could that be I thought. In l969 I was the Santa at Bayview Secondary when I started teaching and high school kids sat on my knee and I gave them presents. None of them were Japanese and all of them could speak English. To-day, none of these kids could speak English and for sure they didn’t want to sit on my lap. Just look at the pictures of the crying babies. As you may or may not know, I live in a building and an area that is about 90 percent Japanese.

Being Santa just topped of my day.Unfortunately, I had a meeting with the director of the school earlier in the day and she asked me to be the principal of the Bangna campus since the incumbent had just resigned. It was actually a no win situation for me since what do you say to the boss when you are asked such a question? Actually, I did have an answer and asked it politely”: is there anyone else you had in mind?” Only you she replied. I had no more questions..

I guess the advantages of taking the job are that being a principal is the only job I have not had in teaching so it will round out my career nicely and I am sure I will learn why all principals tell me they would rather be in the classroom. Secondly, it is the principal’s who get the presents at the end of the year for simply sitting in the office and doing their jobs and thirdly have the big retirement parties at the end of their careers. I guess I also like the fact that principals have signing authority to witness a passport application even though there will not be a big run on my signature since we are no longer in Canada. But truthfully, there is some prestige, rightly or wrongly, with being a principal. A small taste at the end of my career hopefully will not be bad.

On the other hand, I will have to spend two hours a day in a cab since the school is at the other end of the world, all of my present friends will no longer be my friends once it sinks in they have to suck up to me since I am the boss and thirdly, like every other principal on this campus in the last few years, I am sure I will end up resigning. I just hope I can feel good about myself at the end of the experience and not make too much of a mess of things left in my wake. I know I am good at certain things like human relations but not so good at timetabling and so on. In fact, I have no interest in those things so I hope someone on staff is interested and would be willing to do it. I guess the first thing I will have to do is figure out how the timetable works and when the periods are.

To-day we are off to Vietnam and will spend the rest of the year there. I will take my computer but who knows if I will get a chance to use it. The tour looks to be pretty heavy.We have organized a private car and tour guide and will be traveling from the north to the south over the next 10 days. Hopefully, I can let you know how we are enjoying it if any of the hotels have Internet.