My Friend, the Pill

"Your little friend is a big pill!!"

That's what the Director of the Intensive English Program told me the other day about my new buddy, Z. My first reaction was to have my hackles raised. And to flip her off. I'm a little protective like that. I still regret that I didn't somehow greatly endanger the numbnut who bothered BatMite! while he was still around to be endangered. But it seemed like it would make the situation worse, and it seemed like BatMite! was really uncomfortable with me doing anything, so I forbore from making things worse. It didn't prevent me from menacing one of the other numbnuts involved, and he goes out of his way to avoid me. I don't really threaten people exactly, I just, I don't know, hold them accountable, I guess. Not standing for stuff is frightening enough in itself, I suppose. Incidentally, the girls at work are getting me a giant wooden spoon as a going away present--for stirring shit with. They think I don't know.

So when the woman called Z a pill, it pissed me off. But really, she's right. My friend is a pill. I met Z because I'm supposed to be tutoring her in English speaking. She's from Turkey. She makes me all this great food, which I'm not officially supposed to be eating, because I'm not officially supposed to be in her house. I'm supposed to be in a public place. Whatever. Her English isn't that hot, especially her comprehension when people are speaking to her. I helped enroll her in the IEP program at the university I work at, and so she's had an intensive two weeks or so with it. And she's been a total pill about it.

I took her over when we first registered her, and the director was trying to get her to sign up for two classes. We could only afford one--actually, she couldn't afford any, I was footing the bill as a loan for the first one. I kept explaining that. The director told us to see her the next day. So back we came (mind you, I'm switching around my work hours to get this done), and the director out of her generosity offers her the second class for free. f-r-e-e-. So we take it, and it only took about 45 minutes later when I was sitting at my office for greed to kick in. She and her husband called and said "Three?" I tried to explain to Z that this way she didn't have to take out a loan; that if the director thought she really could've paid for the class this whole time that it looks like we were tricking the director; that it looks really fucking ingrateful. I explained the same thing to her husband, who speaks much better English. They chose to ignore me and approach the director about it anyway. And to approach the director about switching Z to another class at a higher speaking level--even though Z couldn't ask for these things on her own. They were in the office probably half a dozen times in the first couple of days.

So when I went in to pay for Z's class (loan, really), I got the "Your little friend is a big pill" diatribe.

I tried to explain to Z and her husband that they were annoying the piss out of the director. In typical immigrant fashion (I know what that looks like, I worked it for a while so keep your pc comment to yourself), they went w-a-y overboard and decided that instead of just, you know, staying out of the damned office and doing your work, that Z should totally float under the radar and they should quit the free class. I tried to explain to them that in American culture, to throw a gift back in the giver's face, especially one that involves a break on money or cost, was incredibly insulting, probably moreso than insulting the giver's mother, and that they would only make matters worse. Z got a stiff neck about taking "charity," and she kept on in that stubborn vein until I reminded her that she was taking charity--my loan for the other class. Then she shut up about it and dropped it.

Goddamn, she's hard to work with sometimes.

There was something about her that I liked a lot from the very beginning. Then I found out her story. She was an engineer in her home country, Turkey. She's also conservative Muslim, although her husband is more of a cultural Muslim. She was prevented from getting her PhD in Turkey, because they made it illegal for veiled women to go to the university. She being the stubborn little coot she is, she of course chose her right to wear whatever the hell she wanted over beaurocracy. She has been in the US for a couple of years and is bored silly. She was one of ten women in Turkey specifically trained for her field by European Union scientists and engineers on an exchange program. She was the only one of those women who was veiled. Her field? Nanotechnology.

It blew me away to imagine somebody so talented, so driven who was held back and was basically a housefrau because she couldn't speak the language well enough to do anything else. It's like the English language is between her and her destiny (or, one could say the idiotic Turkish government, who "tolerates" until they think it politically expedient to brown nose Europe--yeah, I'm a little biased--is between her and her destiny). Her tutoring became Important. As big a pill as she can be, this woman needs to get back to the business of her life. Her dream is to finish her graduate education so she can use nanotechnology to fight cancer. That's the stuff I remember going over in basic Chemistry when I was a damned undergraduate over a decade ago as part of a "what we hope we can do in the future" lecture. Seems like it was the same lecture as the buckminsterfullerene "bucky balls" lecture (who, incidentally, has an awesome inventor). And Z could actually do it. She lives in a little rundown three room apartment that is part of a converted old house; she makes the most awesome grape leaves (anything, really) and chai (tea). She's taught me half a dozen Turkish words. She begins all conversations about Turkey with "Now, when you come to Turkey..." as though it's simply a given that we'll go there sooner rather than later. She's got sparkly eyes and a wicked sense of humor that comes out even though she has a really limited vocabulary. She led the women's student group who protested the imposing of the headscarf ban at her university in Turkey when it happened. I have no idea what her general attitude gave off about her, because I normally don't take on ESL students while I'm working (there's just no time) and I certainly didn't know any of her story before I took her on as an English "project". There was just something about her. And damn, I like her.

She told me something at the last meeting we had after she had read the paragraphs she'd composed for class to me and I had really praised her for her work--she's a quick learner. She smiled and said "Senin sayende." I think that's right. I work in phonics when she tells me stuff, and I know "one, two and three" as "beersch, icky, ooch". I'm sure they're spelled much differently. Anyway, "senin sayende" is an idiomatic expression that apparently means something like "I am what I am because of you." It was beautiful, and it touched my heart.

So, yeah, she's my little friend. And she's a big pill.

-- DV