Ali noticed that there was still one empty seat left at the farthest left at the very back of the classroom. He wondered who that missing student would be but he had a task in hand at the moment.
"Anyone who would like to introduce themselves? Just your name will do. No pressure." Ali said, once again after the students who had just came in had seated themselves comfortably in their respective seats.
Observing that none of her classmates was going to respond to the new teacher's request, the class leader stood up hesitantly. Her hands were distractedly fixing her already-neatly draped headscarf while her eyes darting towards her classmates.
Ali noticed her from before. Unlike her classmates who were joining in and laughing to the joke made by the two boys previously, she was one of the few who looked thoroughly uncomfortable by the whole situation.
"Your name, please." He asked.
"Maria. Maria Rahman." She answered confidently, in contrast to her previous hesitant outlook. Her voice sounded clear and warm.
"Maria. You're the class leader, right?" Ali asked again.
"Yes." She answered with a nod.
"Thank you, Maria. Anyone else?"
No one raised their hand just as he expected. However, this time Ali made up his mind. He proceeded to point at certain students one by one, row by row. Once pointed out, they had no choice but to get up and introduce themselves shortly.
Ali gulped nervously when it was Anna's turn but thankfully, she introduced herself normally. She was good at pretending as if she and the girl who called Ali 'peasant' earlier that morning were not the same person.
Though, it was hard to dismiss the fact that she had kept her eyes fixed on the clock above his head the whole time.
The task went smoother and faster than previously. Even the two boys who was being a nuisance previously, cooperated albeit reluctantly.
When it was the last girl at the back's turn, she pushed her chair back slowly, flinching when the chair started screeching over the floor before standing up straight with her hands fidgeting on the table. The seat next to her was empty.
"I am Vanitha, and my full name is Vanitha a/p Madhuri."
Although she looked clearly nervous like a mouse in front of a cat with her being the mouse and Ali as the cat and her eyes kept avoiding Ali's, she was coherent and clear. Ali nodded impressed.
Taking his nod as a cue, she pulled her chair back carefully, this time without the screeching sound and sat down with pressed lips.
Glad that he finally finished with the attendance and could finally start teaching, which was the main reason he became a teacher, Ali instructed the students to open their textbooks with his old History textbook ready in hand.
While waiting for his students, Ali looked down to his watch and seemed like he only got an hour left. After checking that everyone got their book open to that specific page, he started reciting the passage in the textbook animatedly.
"If you see the picture of an old man with long white beard and serban* in the exam and you cannot remember his name, just think like this. When you want to address an old man, what do you call him? 'Tok' right? Also, this person has beard and 'Janggut' means beard. So that means this person is …"
*serban = Muslim male headdress, usually white in colour.
Ali suddenly interrupted by the creaking sound of the back door opening, earning the attention of all the occupants in the classroom.
A female student with her hair up in a simple bun walked in and went straight to the empty seat next to Vanitha, without sparing a single look towards Ali, who was standing at the front or towards anyone else for those matters.
The student was a lean, fair-skinned, and angular-faced girl. Apart from the prominent jagged scar across her right cheek, she looked like any normal high school student with her clean and tidy school uniform.
She sat down and continued taking out her school stationeries and laying them out one by one on the table while pointedly ignoring everyone's glances on her. Her body language screamed 'leave me alone.'
Ali clicked his tongue at the student's brazen behaviour. He was annoyed like any other teacher would be and as a teacher, how could he simply close his eyes after witnessing such bad attitude from a student?
Though he was quite surprised that he will be dealing with a female rebellious student this time. He had become so used to reprimanding male students who often acted out after getting a dare from their peers, that he momentarily forgot that gender was never been a factor to having an attitude.
Not only she was an hour late, but she had also entered the classroom through the back door as if the front door did not exist without even acknowledging the teacher standing in front.
Much less to apologize and explain the reason for her lateness to him.
As a teacher, he could forgive tardiness. He was once a student and knew how hard it is to leave the comfortable bed and wake up early in the morning to go to school and learn stuffs that he is not interested in every single day.
If there is one thing he could not forgive, however, it is bad manners.
People often ignore this because having good manners cost nothing, but it can buy everything. That everything includes things that cannot be bought by money like love and respect from others.
Quick example, you cannot expect a server not to spit in their food secretly if you deliberately made your order difficult and treated them like a servant when they are not.
Same as teachers. You cannot expect them not to scold you if you are late and did not have the common sense to apologize.
He could not care less when the students in front of him made up some of the best students in the school. That is because for him, a person without good manner is nothing and from the looks of it, seemed like some of his student's manners were in desperate need of fixing.
"The one who just came in, what is your name?" Ali closed his book with a sigh while fixing his gaze on the student.
She glanced towards Ali with both her arms crossed over her chest. Despite obviously hearing his question, she refused to answer and quickly directed her gaze to the textbook laid open on the table.
Ali did not notice that he had gritted his teeth so hard that it started colliding with each other. Vanitha flitted his gaze guiltily between Ali and her stubborn desk partner.
Seeing that her friend was not going to relent, she held up her hand and answered with her fingers fiddling under her desk, "Her name is Dami, Sir."
Ali shook his head.
This nice girl covering up for her friend, was not helping the situation.
Seeing the guiltless expression on the other, Ali clicked his tongue in annoyance while looking down the name list of students in his hand.
Ignoring the hushed whispers among the students in front of him anticipating his next reaction, he ticked in the box next to the only name that he had yet to tick.
Ali looked up to see Vanitha hung her head down in embarrassment. His gaze flitted to the person next to her. He sighed at the contrasting attitude between the two. The one was supposed to feel embarrassed of themselves, was not embarrassed at all.
He shook his head. Just what is this situation?
"Thank you, Vanitha." The person mentioned, immediately held up her head in surprise. "By the way, Vanitha, can I ask a question?" She nodded quickly.
"Is the person next to you deaf?" A general gasp from the boys and the girls alike heard echoing through the classroom.
The female student flinched and immediately turned her face towards Ali, her eyes widening in shock. "Thought you did not hear me. Stand up straight and tell me why you are late."
Seeing no movement from her, Ali continued, his voice raising in anger, "Do I have to tell you twice?!"
She finally stood up with pursed lips, her eyes blinking repeatedly with fear. "I overslept." She answered after a moment of silence with a faint voice, like a whisper.
After letting out an exasperated sigh, Ali said, "Sit down. Now, I need all of you to listen. I am your teacher, and this is my rules. My rules are basically the same as common sense and I'm sure all of you have one but I will say this. For once only so open your ears and listen."
He paused. Only after making sure that each of his student's eyes were on him did he continued, "You can be late to my class, only and only if you have good reason to be. You can choose to enter my class like a normal person or like a wild animal."
"Animals will enter into the room in whatever door or hole they can find because they have no brain to think. A person with a brain will enter through the front door because that is what a good, respectful person would do. They will feel sorry for being late and interrupting the class so they will approach the teacher and apologize. Dami, now demonstrate to us how a person enter into the class."
Ali had no idea what had caused him to use such a savage comparison. The annoyance that he felt
The feeling of humiiation was visible on her face as the other student's eyes were fixed on her, waiting for her response. Her eyebrows crinkled in anger.
Ali expected her to refuse as his brain started working out the next thing to do but to his surprise, she suddenly stood up and walked out, closing the back door which she had left open earlier.
She then walked to the front door, entered and walked back to her seat. Although Ali did not get the apology that he asked, he was pretty satisfied.