Jen is Superfluous

There are no students here today.  There are no other teachers here.  But I’m here.  I’m really not into complaining, but I am into pointing out when things are stupid, which this is.*

Now, I can see this from my school’s point of view.  The other teachers and students must come to school every other Saturday, and I don’t have to.  The other teachers have to grade papers while I don’t do grades and they must be really busy because most of them are here when I get here in the mornings and are here when I leave at 4:30pm.  I totally get that they aren’t happy with the discrepancy between how much they work and get paid and how much I work and get paid (I don’t actually know how much they make, but I have heard it’s less than I do).  That wouldn’t make me very sympathetic towards the Native English Teacher either, if I perceived how very little work she had to do compared to me.   However, I am not in a situation where I’m getting the shitty end of the deal because I didn’t put myself in that position.  I am taking advantage of circumstances that are skewed favorably in my direction. Sorry I’m opportunistic.  Sorry you didn’t have that opportunity, but don’t begrudge me a day off when every other human in the school is off-campus somewhere because it’s just PETTY.  And what’s worse, completely illogical.  I am literally costing the school money in electricity as I sit here and BLOG.  How is that making everything fair and square?

It's so Petty.

Honestly, I don’t balk at working the days I’m supposed to be working.  I understand that working begets paychecks, and I’m fine with that whole setup.  I know it’s in my contract to work every single weekday this year, save for my 18 vacation days and 11 national holidays.  But that doesn’t mean my logical brain doesn’t also know how ridiculous it is to force me to come to an empty school today (with no work to be done!), and not only that but for nobody to have bothered to tell me why there isn’t anyone else here besides the one ‘temporary’ English teacher (who is Korean and is pretty much in the same boat as me, as far as I can tell), and the Vice Principal.  Seriously, I have literally no idea what is going on.  So maybe it’s the combination of the pettiness of making me come in for no reason and the inconsideration of not keeping me in the loop that’s prompted me to write this.  Those things plus 8 hours of free time to fill.

So in conclusion, I’m not complaining, I’m detailing out why it’s petty and uptight to try to create fairness in the world by punishing those who got the better end of a deal.  Does this relieve any other teachers of the burden of grading tons of papers or working later than me?  Is making both our situations worse contributing to the greater good?  Nope.  I rest my case.

*I know, I know, it’s a different culture.  I ALWAYS consider that when there’s anything that makes me go “What the…?”, but I’m not budging on this one.  There is no reason for me to be here except for the fact that I signed a contract that says I will.  This is like the home team batting in the bottom of the 9^th when they’ve already won the game – pointless and a waste of time.