A Play's the Thing

This update’s a little late, but I’ve been a little busy the last few weeks.

This fall, I decided I wanted to branch out a little from the English clubs I had mostly stuck to the first semester I was at the school. So, I put up flyers for theater clubs, one in the morning for the younger students who attend school in the afternoon, and one in the afternoon for the older kids. As with anything here, attendance varied, until we got closer to the assembly I decided to hold as a culmination of the students’ work.

With each group, I led a brainstorming session to decide on a story, and then planned setting, characters, plot, and some dialogue. Then, based on what we’d discussed, I wrote up the plays in English. The younger kids chose a folk tale called Tuk-Tuk Xanim, about an ant that is lonely and goes in search of a friend. With a little rewriting to emphasize the lesson of friends helping each other, the play was all set to go. The older kids chose an original story about vampires and werewolves, and a group of people at a school. This one took a little more molding and forming.

We faced some difficulties with rehearsals as the assembly room was often in use by others for everything from meetings to chess lessons. But rehearse we did, and as the day for the assembly grew closer, students seemed to come out of the woodwork with interest to take part. Suddenly, the shepherd had a whole flock of sheep as I attempted to find parts for the kids. Eventually, a line had to be drawn and I regrettably had to turn away some kids. One boy decided he wanted to be Santa Claus, or as he is called here, Shaxta Baba, and before I could turn him away, he showed up with a costume, gifts to present to the director and teachers which he had purchased with his own money and money he had collected from other students, and masks for the cats in the Tuk-Tuk Xanim play. Sure, he may have bought his way in, but his enthusiasm was pretty darn contagious.

The assembly day came, and I had to rush to the passport office to get my new local ID card before buying last minute supplies for the production. When at last a meeting for the parents of graduating seniors ended, we flooded into the room to decorate it for the assembly. Suddenly, there were balloons and garlands, and kids trying on their masks and practicing their lines, while others tried desperately to sneak in to watch or peak through the door. It was madness, but it was a wonderful, seasonal madness in which I couldn’t help but find myself reveling. The head of the local Education Ministry joined the school directors and teachers, and kids streamed in to fill the rest of the seats.

First up were the younger kids with Tuk-Tuk Xanim, which just about went as perfectly as I could hope. Next, a couple teachers read a dialogue they’d written with very minimal help from me about their home rayon (Ismayilli, of course). A third teacher backed out at the last minute, so his parts were scrapped. He had gotten stage fright because he didn’t think his pronunciation was good enough. He is learning, but it’s slow going as he must still write everything first as it is written and then phonetically, so he knows how to pronounce each word. Third, the older kids performed their play. It was a bit looser as they had had fewer days to practice. So much of their time is taken up with tutoring sessions to prepare them for university exams. Some days three would show up, and the next day, three different students would come. In retrospect, perhaps I rushed them a bit, but I had hoped they would put in effort at home to memorize the lines and places. The last part of the assembly was a rendition of “Jingle Bells,” while Santa and Qar Qiz (Snow Girl) came to the front of the room and gave out presents. The students were a little shaky on the verses, but when they came to the chorus, they brought the house down. Of course, no assembly is complete without a few speeches, so the school director and Education head gave their holiday greetings, thanks to myself and to the students, and words of wisdom (I presume, I didn’t follow everything). I was then ushered, along with my sitemate, who had recently returned from her medical leave, into the director’s office for tea, and the director was very kind with his compliments. And really, who doesn’t like tea and compliments?