1990 Belfast

Belfast 1990

Life as the invisible men

My thoughts were as follows: "Must settle down and stop wandering and find a job in Northern Ireland where I can put my experience to good use – for the benefit of the Northern Irish community” (and my family of course!) Yes, so that is what we would do – re-enter the educational system of Northern Ireland after many years of travelling in Africa, South America, Mexico and the Middle East. It had all been interesting, but  I would now do the thing which everyone was urging and expecting me to do. re-enter the system. The party was over!

Perhaps I wasn’t right about much of this, but I was certainly right about the 'party'.

We had a small amount of  savings from Dubai and a tiny little Town house in Belmont, Belfast where Roger spent his second year in school.(His first was in Dubai). It was great to hear him develop a Belfast accent after the awful English one in Dubai.

There were many changes and surprises to cope with – the weather, the indoor life, the lack of friends. It was surprisingly difficult to take up where we had left off with my old friends of my youth – they were all married and struggling like us to bring up their families. They were surprisingly disinterested in our comings and goings. After a few months I gave up even talking about our past. I eventually began to feel that I had never really left Northern Ireland. It was like waking up with amnesia-having forgotten about ten years of our life. We didn’t see much of my family or friends - my brothers and their wives were often  'too busy' to see us.  Mum and Dad who of course loved seeing the children and Maria. Everybody else seemed so busy. Nobody called, and when I called on them - my brothers, their wives and my old friends, they all  looked at me with a “Whadduwant” expression on their faces? After a while I felt as though I were imposing and stopped calling.

But by far the biggest shock of all was something I had never expected – my inability to get a job. I had never in my wildest dreams thought that at 38 I would not be able to re-enter the system. Surely, potential employers would be dropping their jaws in admiration at the boldness of my exploits around the world and I would have to take the phone off the hook to give my self a break from headmasters headhunting me in my little fortress in Belmont?

“ Mr. Nixon. ‘We admire your sense of adventure, your courage, your pioneering spirit and above all your dedication to voluntary service. This is just what we need at Belfast Royal Academy/ Methodist College/ Lagan College etc. Can you start on Monday….?”

Alas, no. I visited many schools and Headmasters but could not raise a flicker of interest. (There was no internet in those days, you had to write or phone and try and get a Headmaster to meet you) I did get a term’s replacement teaching at my old school Methodist College in the Biology Department.T hat was because my old colleague Donal had been ill and I was in the right place at the right time. But after Christmas there was almost nothing. I applied to all the local Grammar schools and even to some Government schools. I got  4 weeks at a catholic grammar school. money was running out. Maria was preganat with a third child. My old friend, David,  got me an interview at Dromore High School. The interview was another farce (All my interviews seem to have been farces-why is that??).

There were four or five guys – rural stalwarts of the county Armagh Protestant community. Their questions mostly involved finding out how many workshops I had attended on the latest curriculum developments in the UK. Naturally I knew nothing about those having ben in mexico, colombia, dublin and Malawi for most of the time.

I didn’t get the job. At no stage did they show the slightest interest in my dashing exploits in tropical climes. I think they had read my Curriculum.Vitae and decided that it concealed suspicious contacts with Rome. By now, my savings were almost depleted and we were living on the dole. Even the relief work was drying up. i consdiered giving up teaching and working in a travel agaent. Surely, with all my expereince, they would be interested?  I made a few enquiries, nobody was interested. I went for an interview at Randox chemicals (obtained through a friend of Mum's). They weren't interested but they didn't say why. Desperate situations require desperate remedies. in desperation,  I headed for Gardners on Botanic Avenue for the Times Educational supplement! 

And there were several jobs I was interested in –one in a special school in the south of England in Romford, one in Papua New Guinea, and one in Australia. I applied for them all.

Meanwhile I had decided to do a post Grad Diploma in Teaching English as a Foreign Language. This was the Trinity London Diploma course taught under license by Grafton Tuition Centre from Dublin. The lecturers came to Belfast on two nights a week for three hours for six months. The Director was a friendly Irishman who had been in Zambia. He was very keen on me doing the course. Some of the lecturers were a little sus but others were excellent. It was a slightly looser, less professional world than mainstream teaching but I found the course very interesting and I knew it would give me the opportunity to teach foreigners some day. teaching English as an 'insurance policy' in case things went wrong in the mainstream world, which I knew was a distinct possibility.....

I was rapidly becoming fed up with white Anglo Saxon culture. In Methody I had been quite shocked to return for a term  to cheeky students who wouldn’t listen to me. When I had taught full-time in Methody between 1978-1980 there had been none of that. It used to be a great place to teach in. But by 1990 it was different. Some of the relief classes I had taught had been appalling. 

Getting back to the Teaching English course some of the students were interesting but I remember one awful female who kept coming late, not doing her homework, and then slowing down our progress by asking the teacher to go over what she had missed. It all came to a head one night when yours truly grabbed the nettle and asked her not to keep interrupting as we needed to get on to pass the exam which was approaching fast. It was by no means a cakewalk–the course or the exam. Of course I made a mortal enemy of her and in the final class she had her revenge by showering me in a torrent of abuse, much to everyone’s embarrassment She didn’t turn up for the exam and I scraped through in the end - very proud of myself!

I had another farsiccal interview in Romford Essex for a special school. I don’t understand it but they seemed uninterested in me from the moment I arrived! Maybe they had contacted my former emplyers or refereees? I dunno. I was glad I didn’t get the job in the end –it would not have suited at all –it was dealing with rich kids with behavioural problems.I don’t know why they even wanted to interview me-or maybe they had phoned my boss in Colombia or Dubai!

I remember walking along the streets of Belfast thinking I would do anything just to have a job. I considered doing a travel agents course. But it was catch 22 I was underqualifed to teach the local Irish, in their eyes anyway, and overqualified for just about everything else. There was nothing for it - I had to go back to Gardners to get the Times Educational supplement!

And then one day at about seven in the morning the phone rang in our little house in Belmont. It was a Yorkshire accent – my first contact from a Yorkshireman, RS at The Kilmore International school in Australia. He seemed very affable and keen to interview me as soon as possible.

“ Fine” , I said, “where?”

“In London”

“When” ? I said.

“Day after tomorrow”, he said.

But I wondered how he was going to get to London from Melbourne so soon?

“ The Chairman of the Board will call you today and set up the interview in London”

I was so delighted I didn’t ask any more questions. I didn’t want to ask too many questions. As usual I was desperate to get the job. Two days later I winged my way to London for the interview with l C..

The first thing that struck me as curious in London was the casual way in which the Chairman of the Board was dressed. He  greeted me in his very modest London apartment in his dressing gown. I mention this specifically because it was not the only time he did it. A few months later he did exactly the same thing again when we arrived in Melbourne from Ireland.

The next thing that was curious was that there was no sign in the apartment of the Principal from Melbourne.– the yorkshireman I had talked to on the phone.

As usual, the interview was a farce! I took him thru my C.V. in the normal way. Significantly, he chattered about my background at Campbell College in Belfast. He had taught at Rugby school and had received Campbell on some Rugby tour – he therefore knew Bob Mitchell –my old housemaster at Campbell.  That seemed to be the end of the interview as far as Nigel was concerned anyway.

After about half an hour I casually remarked upon the Principal’s absence .

‘Oh him!’ said NC ‘He’s in hospital’

‘Nothing serious I hope’, I said, and then venturing a little humour ‘not having a nervous breakdown or anything - Ha! Ha!’

‘No, no’ he said, ‘he should be out soon’.

I always suspected that was the first little porky pie the chairman  told me. I believe that the Principal, the Yorkshireman,  was in hospital.suffering from mental exhaustion.


The Chairman  seemed to want to talk more about the owner of the school - who was fondly referred to by his employees as the ‘Blowfly’ (in honour of his management style. the blowfly is famous in australia form arriving unecetdyly and uninvited quite sudden;y and abruptly on your an unwanted palce such as the lips)).

I never could work out how much the chairman  really knew about what the blowfly was really like at this stage. I remember asking him the question at the interview towards the end. As the blowfly  was the owner of the school and had just moved on to the school premises with his wife, ,alarm bells were ringing so I asked the chairman,   what were the  blowfly and his wife  like? 

I knew this was the crucial question.

’ Well, I don’t really know’ said the chairman, ‘but the blowfly  and his wife seem to me to me to be an uncommonly decent couple’

Fatally reassured by this assessment I was hooked. I took the job and the bait, hook, line and sinker. After all, how could a chap from Rugby School be wrong? The Campbell Rugger team had after all toured the school with my housemaster!

Before I had arrived back in Belfast, the chairman had phoned Maria , my wife,  to offer me the job.

the chairman  had obviously been impressed with me!

Could I say no? Of course not! The die was well and truly cast for the next chapter in the Nixon Saga. 

Deputy Principal and I.B. Coordinator for the Kilmore International School.

Big brother Roger had his Australian contacts investigate the school and the assessment was not good. ‘Financially unstable’ was the verdict.

‘Thanks Roger, but so am I’ I thought– I’ve been on the dole for six months and my savings have gone!

What else could we do ?. I’d been trying to get a job for ten months in Ireland with no success. No-one was interested. We were off to Australia. It was the first of July 1990