New Uses for Chalk

It seemed that some very strange things happened to me after a bout of malaria subsided. Maybe it was just that I was off my guard, worn out. In any case, I remember these three occasions very clearly, despite the fact I was at less than 100%at the time. I can already tell that what I am about to recount won't sound as strange or odd as they struck me then, but I will press on....
I was just back in the classroom for a few hours after my first experience with the disease. It was about 100 degrees with 75% humidity, and I was teaching fifty children in a small, poorly ventilated classroom. I was sweating, weak, but determined to finish the lesson. I hadn't prepared the lesson properly, so I was unaware of what was coming. When we were practicing dialogue, there was a conversation between father and son over allowance. The son asked for a large sum (about fifty dollars) and the father said, "what, do you want to buy an oil well?" The students were a bit perplexed, they didn't get the irony. Luckily, I thought, there was a new offshore oil well right off the coast where I was teaching. I pointed out the window, and asked them in Arabic if they could buy the oil well for 500 riyal (fifty dollars in the Yemeni currency). As if on cue, half of them said "mumkin" - Arabic for maybe. I sat down. Where do you go from there? Anyway, I pressed on, a bit exasperated. I got to a new section of dialogue (that I hadn't read), and we began making progress on a conversation between two friends (British friends, the curriculum was British based). The two friends were arranging a meeting, and the kids took turns reading the parts. At one point, I had a boy and a girl (I had boys and girls in my class, quite a concession for a westerner in a very, very conservative climate!) reading the parts of the friends. We turned the page, and I did not read what was coming. Instead, I heard the boy tell the girl "why don't I come by and knock you up later?" I had had it - I choked, started laughing and couldn't stop. Poor kids. I was choking, laughing, then I got very light-headed. I leaned forward to put my hand on a desk to steady myself and I missed. As I was falling to the floor, I saw their terrified faces. Now my hand missed the corner of the desk, but my head did not. I woke up thirty minutes later in my tent. The kids had carried me back somehow. When I sat up, there were three kids on the floor of my tent staring at me. The had volunteered to stay with me to make sure I was ok. I smiled, considered laughing but thought better of it, didn't want to scare them. I very soberly thanked them and walked them back to the school. When we entered the classroom, a little girl solemnly handed me a piece of chalk as the whole class watched silently. I sat back down in the front of the class, and we continued reading dialogue, not missing a beat. No one ever mentioned the incident again, and I often wonder if it really happened (it did, I still have a small dent in my head).
I had just recovered from my second case of malaria, when I got up the strength to take a long walk. It was my custom to walk out to the beach and walk up and down a few miles in each direction collecting small seashells. I would then make them into jewelry for the girls in the camp. It was another scorching day, and I headed out from my tent. About half a kilometer out, I saw two women approaching me. They were dressed appropriately, but they were not Yemeni. As they approached, I realized they were both very attractive, one older than the other. The older woman made eye contact (the first weird sign) and just as she was about to pass me said "so Michael, you no $&^%^$$&, no?" (you can email me for the uncensored text). I was startled, I had never heard that from a stranger in the US. I supposed she knew who I was as I was the first westerner to ever live in the village, but I couldn't believe she said it, especially in front of the younger woman. I turned and they kept walking as if nothing happened. I shook my head, and chalked it up to the malaria. Later, when I recounted the incident to other Peace Corps friends, they told me I was nuts, so I believed them, at least temporary malaria insanity (TMI). A month later, I was talking to a Somali teacher who was a good friend. We were standing by the school and the woman walked by (it was a very small village). He saw me looking at her and asked if I knew her. I said no, and then I shared the hallucination I had. He laughed very hard, then looked at me and said "so you two have met?" I could tell by his tone and countenance that something was strange. He went on to tell me that the woman had married a man from Djibouti and lived on a naval base with a lot of "sailors." The other woman with her that day was her daughter, and according to my friend, they were both very vocal and vulgar. Sadly, I preferred the hallucination explanation, even if it was my hallucination.
My final post-malarial incident almost caused and international episode, well not quite that bad. I was teaching a very large class (70 students) in a small classroom. As it was an ESL class, I gave all the kids western names for roll call only (given the number of Mohammeds, this was helpful). The kids didn't mind, and they had to pay close attention during daily exercise. Once again, I was just back in the classroom, feeling very weak. I turned to the door where I saw my Somali friend standing with the local security agent. Yemen modeled its security protocols after the East Germans I am told. I believe it. This man had followed me quite a bit during my first few months in the village. He was large for a Yemeni, wore a perpetual scowl along with a pearl-handled 45 in his waistband. He never spoke to me or acknowledged me. Now he was in my doorway with a translator. I knew I was not going to enjoy the interchange. I gave my students something to do for a few minutes and attended to my guests. My friend translated - apparently there was a complaint that I was trying to prosthelytize the students by giving them Christian names. I patiently explained why I used the names, how it helped the kids learn proper nouns, etc. The security agent just shook his head and glared at me. I took a few steps back to write something on the blackboard for the students when my friend translated the last bit of the conversation. He told me that I was to discontinue the activity immediately or I would regret it. Maybe it was the malaria (nice name for a book I think),or maybe it was just me, but I had had enough. I took the chalk I was holding, hurled it at him hitting him in the chest. All the oxygen in the room was sucked out by 75 simultaneous gasps. I walked to the door, edged past the two visitors telling my friend the translator "tell him to teach the damn class." I then went back to my tent for a rest. An hour later a large contingent from the community came to my tent. We spent two hours discussing the issue. Finally, I was allowed to continue my English roll call, and I apologized publicly to my foe. He was happy, I was happy, and I had no more discipline problems in the class for several months.