’T’ for teacher

When I first started teaching, my students were very curious about me. One day, a student came up to me and looked at the cross around my neck and asked me, “Teacher, kenapa pakai huruf ’t’? ’T’ untuk ‘teacher’ ke?” (Teacher, why are you wearing the letter t? Does it stand for teacher?). I was amused at his innocence while the rest of his friends quickly corrected him and told him that that was “’t’ orang Kristian”.

It was only natural as I was one of the few people in the school who wasn’t of the same race and religion as them. I did my best to blend in and not offend anyone, be it the students or the teachers. I wore a baju kurung to school every day and took great care to adhere to every rule because I wanted to choose my battles carefully. I was in a school where most of my students struggled with the basics in writing and reading, and I knew that all my energy and focus had to be directed at putting them on a different life trajectory.

One day, a visiting lecturer witnessed my fellow teacher and I giving some money to a student to buy food. She asked me about it, and I told her that the student was in our after school reading programme and came from a very poor family. We help them in whatever way we can. She commented on how touched she was by our efforts and more so with the fact that we weren’t of the same race or religion, yet we were helping them.

I was truly shocked. As a teacher, I believe that my only duty is to teach students and impart good values to them. As a teacher, I had to do my best to help them in any way possible. As a teacher, I had a responsibility, to the nation and to myself to ensure my students turn out to be useful members of the society. As a teacher, it didn’t matter where I was sent or who I was teaching, it only mattered that I carried out my duties as an educator.

A few months ago, I was back home for the holidays when I met up with an old family friend. She told me how she read about me and the work that I do with the kids. She then added how I wasn’t really helping the people of my race or religion.

“I don’t see the point”, she said, “of helping someone who is not the same as you.” At that juncture, I realised how tired I was of defending myself and what I do over and over again to people who were too blind to look beyond the invisible boundaries set by race and religion.

What saddens me most is that I get these comments from adults and not the children I teach. My students are curious about my race or religion but they have never treated me differently because I didn’t share the same beliefs as them. If anything, my students are more than happy to spend time with me. I often tell them how I care for them as much as I would for my own brother and sister. In return, my students enjoy having meals with me or staying back after school to work on projects. In my three years as a teacher, they hardly ever ask me why I choose to teach them although I was not of the same religion.

The cross around my neck shows I’m Christian, but if you take it away, I will still be a Christian. To some of my students, it was nothing more than the letter “t” to show that I’m a teacher. The race and religion I belong to may be my identity but it has never stood in the way of how I will treat another human being.

How selfish have we become to believe that we should only help people of our own race and religion? How selfish have we become to believe that we are made only to serve the people who are the “same” as us? Don't we, after all, share the common identity of being Malaysians? – April 24, 2015.

* This is the personal opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insider.