(R) Colombia 1984-1986

Colombia

I accepted the job in Colombia and we were very excited at the time.

I remember arriving in Cali and being met by Jack Cushnan, my boss, at the airport. We were put up in a hotel with the other 17 new teachers. We were the very last to arrive. It was a very long journey and Maria was pregnant with Roger. The next day Jack took me to the school and started to tell me about the job he wanted me to do. So many times it has happened to me in my career – being offered a job the details of which are not disclosed until AFTER  arrival in the host country! Who is to blame for this?  Me, of course! I was very naive...


I remember Jack saying to me at this meeting. " Boy, you're going to be very busy ". I chuckled amiably (but rather naively, in retrospect) at the time!

This turned out to be a serious understatement!  It was an absurd job description both from the point of view of quantity and quality. However, Jack was shrewd enough to know that I was naive enough not to know!  In addition to a 50 percent teaching load I had the huge area of responsibility for discipline in school. I was also the International Baccalaureate Coordinator. More importantly, it was only after I had been in Cali for several weeks that I learned the truth about what had happened in the year before my appointment....

What Jack hadn't told me in the interview was that there had been a scandal at the school involving the final year students-six of them I believe. Apparently these six students had tried to bribe the guy who worked the photo copier to give them some exam papers before school tests. These exams were important because the marks counted towards admission to universities. The scam was discovered and Jack was horrified!  It was difficult for him to know what to do with the students because some of them were well connected to board members!  the Chairman of the board was effectively Jack's boss! I was told that the son of the Chairman was involved. Eventually, Jack decided to expel  the students - a very courageous (or maybe foolish) move!

However, the consequences of the expulsions went far beyond what anyone could have expected in their wildest dreams (or nightmares). There were divisions among parents, and I understand the school was almost closed as a result of this scandal. Jack survived somehow, but only just . He had a lot of ‘Palancas’ (friends in high places) after 14 years but he had to call all their favours in to win this one. People said  that in his  latter years Jack had become quite distant from the day-to-day running of the school. He had left this in the hands of his senior teacher Jeremy Stendall, who was an exceptionally kind man, but not a strong man with respect to discipline. The school discipline had therefore become slack under Jeremy. Jack blamed Jeremy for the scandal. Enter stage left Don Nixon as Vice Rector and head of Discipline!

I was so naive in those days. I was so very excited at the prospect of such a responsible position. I was newly married and on cloud 19. I knew the the job was going to be ‘full-on’ as they say in Australia but that was not going to daunt me! I was invincible!

I set about my task of cleaning up the discipline with relish . I monitored what was going on with the Jefe de Bachillerato, Carlos Castrillon . He had been running the discipline in the secondary section anyway. After a month I was staggered at what I  found. Carlos was using a a Friday detention system. The number of students referred for detention was often listed between 30 and 40 each week, sometimes more. Each detention had to be approved by Carlos. I then visited the Friday afternoon detentions to find that there were often less than ten students actually attending the detention! In some cases I found out that Carlos had overruled the teacher, or in other cases, the student had simply not turned up for the detention! To my young and inexperienced mind the situation seemed perfectly ridiculous. How could 40 students on a list be reduced to ten? The situation was made even more ludicrous by the fact that when I visited the detentions students appeared to be playing cards - thus defeating the whole purpose of the detention!

I made a full report to Jack who was delighted and asked me to produce a plan to improve the system .

Easy! I proposed that any student who did not attend the Friday detention would have a Saturday detention which I personally would supervise. Any student who failed to turn up for a Saturday morning would be suspended for three days. Jack thought this was a great idea and it was immediately put into practice.

The effects were far - reaching. First of all, students got worked up about the idea-especially the final year 11. They had a meeting in the science lab to discuss these initiatives. They resolved to press for the removal of the new Vice Principal (me) ! Carlos was also furious at what he saw as the erosion of his power and did his best to show solidarity with the year 11 students in an attempt to undermine my position. The most positive effect was that the discipline improved and students were no longer found wandering around in the corridor during class time etc. I was pleased, and Jack was delighted!

However, I was just beginning to feel quite satisfied with myself when Jack announced to me casually one day that he had had a very stormy board meeting the previous evening in which it was suggested that I be sacked and asked to return home!!!

It took me a while to figure out just what my boss Jack meant when when he had said. ‘Good news, you’re not going to be sent home. I had our first Board meeting last night and there was a move to have you sent home-it was defeated - but it was a close thing!’

‘Oh Good’, said I with a grimace masking terror and a total lack of comprehension!  “They wouldn’t have dared” thought I ‘Would they?’ A mere youth of but three and thirty, I didn’t know any better....my first experience of the vagaries of life in the corridors of power.

Another incident concerned the Mr.and Mrs Wright. Maria  and I were sitting down at the sports club relaxing on a Sunday. Newcomers too, Mr. and Mrs. Wright sidled up to us and started rubbishing the school and my boss, Jack. They very unhappy with everything. I was offended, I dutifully reported such disaffection to the appropriate authority (Jack). Jack thanked me profusely and commended me for loyalty. I experienced, for the first time, the exhilaration of knowing I had pleased my boss.

‘By the way’ he said, ‘Do you think you could write a report of the incident?’ I had a fleeting moment of disquiet-but it quickly passed. Jack put the letter in the ‘Wright’ file, if you follow me, and two years later when he didn’t want to renew their contracts he waived the letter in front of them. That made me really popular with the Wrights . As luck would have it – the Wrights  went to Greengates in Mexico city the next year - and guess who followed there at the same time? -Yup-yours truly.(me!)

We had a nice cosy relationship with the Wrights  at Greengates! Before this I was unsure about the existence of God, but when the Wrights turned up at Greengates I knew there was no God! Englishman!

I now began to realize that I been very naive! I have always had this perfectionist and idealistic streak which made me believe things were black and white. Clearly, they were sometimes gray! I was unnerved by Jack’s comments and began to realize for the first time the reality: that the fortune of my family was in the hands of these people on the Board, and of Jack himself. My belief in natural justice began to erode.

Nevertheless, I pursued my policy with (in retrospect) some success during the following eighteen months. Without a doubt any objective observer would have agreed that the discipline at the end of my two years in the Colombo Britanico had vastly improved.

But from that time on I was going to be much more careful.

Socially, we were very happy in Colombia indeed. Marie was pregnant with Roger and we had the "Muchacha" to help in the house. The Colombians were so friendly. Our neighbors welcomed us to the regular middle class "Barrio" of Mayapan, bringing us presents and inviting us to visit them. We loved this type of hospitality.

Roger was born in February and Gloria, Maria's mother,  was able to come and visit us. We didn't really care about money. In fact, looking back, it was in 1984, and at thirty-two , I was still so naive and didn't consider money as an important issue in life!! Poor Maria! Who had she married ? The reality was that after two years in Colombia we had saved only about one thousand dollars! - and that with the salary of a Vice-Principal of one of the largest bilingual schools in South America.

Our ‘muchachas’ were a problem: we had so many and most of them are best forgotten! But some of them were good - and we were probably a little bit 'exigente' in retrospect. ‘Rosa’ was one of the the good ones recommended by Estelle C (Jacks wife ). Rosa was a plain Jane - but very reliable. When she did something she shouldn't have done she would say "Tienes toda la razon Senor" "which means ‘you are perfectly right sir!”. We let Rosa go after a series of minor misdemeanours. And yet she was one of the best maids we had. In retrospect it was probably a mistake to let her go!

Gustavo and Terry

They were a lovely couple from across the road with the little boy called Armando. Gustavo often invited me to play tennis. We had such great games and such a great fun! They also invited us to come and have dinner. They also invited us to their cottage on a mountain outside Cali –also to their ‘finca’ in and I remember swimming in the freezing water of their pool. Gustavo was a dentist. Amparo and Caesar were close neighbors and very friendly to us also.

Mum and Dad's visit December 1985

At Christmas Mom and Dad came to visit. They had very unlucky outward. trip . They came via Paris, Madrid, Caracas and Bogota!! What a nightmare! It was really too much for  Mum and Dad, and I’ll never forget the sight of Dad at Cali airport. His face was blotched with circulation problems. I'd never seen him like that before and Mom was unwell with a ‘Meuniers’ balance problem . Mom never really recovered throughout the five week trip. But Dad did, and he enjoyed it all.

We went to Cartagena on the coast and stayed in a very modest hotel. Unfortunately, they were robbed in the middle of the night. Some thief put his hand in through the window and stole their credit cards and travellers cheques etc. Fortunately it was all insured. But it was a bit unnerving for all of us.



But the second year was a disaster ! The main problem was a slide on the Colombian peso and the 18 teachers who had come from UK a year earlier found themselves in a very difficult financial position especially if they had financial commitments in UK.

One by one they started to fight with the school -with Jack in particular. They blamed him of course and I don't know really how well jack handled it. Not very well as I think he tended to take the attitude that it was just tough luck! Well, for people with children this clearly was not good enough ! Soon there were resignations. People either resigned or were pushed after an argument. The atmosphere became grimmer and grimmer as the term wore on.

Then, something really dramatic happened ! Rumors began circulating that something very serious involving the police had  happened to Jack.

After a few days he called me in and told me about what had happened. He said that a few days previously he had been driving into his garden from the street when he had heard a ‘Phut’ sound coming from the rear of the car. He got out and noticed that the rear tyre was flat.

He was then astounded to find that beside the car was a woman crying hysterically.A child had been hurt and was lying on the pavement. screaming. Jack could not understand what was wrong but immediately offered assistance to the woman and child before offering to take them to hospital.

He quickly changed his tyre and a arrived with the child in his arms at a hospital. After waiting for some time you he was accosted by the father of the injured child who asked Jack

"Where is the gun?"

Jack was dumbfounded! He was detained all night at the police station and questioned. according to Jack he believed that a gunman had taken a shot at him when he was driving the car into his driveway. He believed this was a revenge attack for the expulsion of the students before my appointment!!

Within the few days of this incident Jack had sent all students home and called a staff- meeting of the whole school in the auditorium. There, in public, he announced his intention of leaving Colombia and going to work in Madrid at the end of the year. It was clearly a message to his ‘enemies’ (the people who had taken a shot at him). They had been successful in getting him to leave.I was his deputy!!

Such melodrama made the atmosphere in school even worse. All sorts of rumors began to circulate. Jack also decided to retire within himself and stopped communicating with many people including myself.

A new Rector was appointed from El Salvador, Michael Cross. During his visit before taking up his appointment, he made it clear that he was not happy with the curriculum documentation. This awoke Jack from his reverie and spurred him back into action in an area in which he had been clearly negligent. The result was a frantic burst of activity which stressed people out even further! It was a rushed and botched job of curriculum documentation. Now, everybody was upset!

I tried to remain as loyal to Jack as possible, but because of my position in daily contact with teachers it was difficult for me to do that without distancing myself from the teachers.

Very few people were intending to extend their contracts.

One day the art teacher, Marila Rudas, the eccentric but very charming Art teacher
came to my office and very diplomatically showed me some documents she had picked up “by mistake” from the desk of Jack’s secretary Florencia. The document was an advertisement in the ‘Times Educational Supplement’ for MY job!

I could not believe it. Jack had advertised my job.  I was flabberghasted, and immediately lost all faith in Jack and my future of the school at this time. This was in April 1986.

It was around about this time that Michael Cross made his visit to the school and it was made clear to me I could stay on as Deputy Principal if I wanted. I said nothing about the advertisement to anyone.

As the final weeks of the year approached things went from bad to worse. There was a bloodbath with people trying to settle scores with Jack . In one very bizarre incident after a goodbye ceremony for Jack, the flowers were scattered all over the gymnasium. I imagine some students had done this as some sort of prank. Jack took it very personally indeed as I was to find out later.

June 16th 1986

On June 16 Jack invited me into the office and told me he was NOT going to renew my contract and that he was going to see to it that I did not get any holiday pay for the summer.. He was in a rage. I could not believe what was happening!

But I was also so angry that I refused to listen to him read a prepared speech to me. I interrupted him furiously with "For what reason? etc etc " as he did not complete the speech I never got the full story but he managed to say that I had been disloyal.

He said his secretary, Florencia had said that when he was in London I had been seen going into his office ! This was of course true, and I did not deny it. It was naive of me in retrospect. I used to go into his office to read the  Times Educational supplement which he, and only he, had access to in those days. (No internet). This was a British newspaper which advertised jobs

He also accused me of being involved in the ' flowers' incident.!! I was so outraged at his behavior that I did something which I later regretted. I overreacted, and ended up giving him what he wanted- which was my resignation!


In my heart I knew I did not want to be part of the whole set up any longer – and I also believed indeed probably (probably wrongly) that Jack was so powerful that I could not fight him. Now, years later I'm sure I was wrong. If I had stayed I'm sure I could have kept my job.

I almost immediately regretted my resignation. But there was no changing it and I realized I had been fooled and manipulated by a very much more experienced man. Maria was of course indignant and and very supportive of me . After getting over her initial shock she actually at one stage took it upon herself to walk several miles to the school where she confronted Jack and asked him for an explanation.

We had to pack up and leave with baby Roger very quickly and had to sell everything. I remember trying to get tax clearance from the Tax office with no help from the school or anybody else. In retrospect it was a truly dreadful, ignominious and shocking departure. My humiliation was total, and my self esteem plummeted. My confidence was severely shaken and I still bear the scars of this departure twenty three years later as I write –although the scars have been covered up by more scars from subsequent battles!

I still occasionally dream about Jack and his unjust behavior, and am as much mystified by it today as I was then. I now know of course that Jack was probably suffering from the initial stages of cancer which was to kill him four years later in Madrid.
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Strangely enough I met his wife Estelle in London at a recruitment conference in 1993 - seven years later. Jack had died of cancer. She passed me in the corridor but would not look at me. A sad end to this chapter. But I must say some of the teachers were very nice to both of us on learning of our precipitate departure. I will always be thankful to Tim Baker and Charles Duckworth in particular for their support in those difficult weeks and months following our departure. Many other teachers were also very kind to us in those final days. This attitude contrasts strongly with the problems after my resignation in Australia a few years later where we felt very isolated, and abandoned by former friends and colleagues .