Greetings, friends!

Today, I want to tell you a story. A story of determination, hope, and exasperation. A story that, in retrospect, may be told with a great deal of humour, if you want it that way (though I may need a bit more time before I find this one funny…). And also, this is a story that I am afraid most (all?) of you will read with a certain level of recognition.

The other day I wanted my pupils to watch a film in class. A lovely little documentary about growing up in South Africa, beautifully made, showing diversity and injustice and hope, rich and poor, black coloured and white, and generally just ideal for our work with that country. You know the feeling, right? When you come across the PERFECT introduction to a new topic? It’s a kick.

So on Friday, well ahead of the bell for lesson two, I go to the classroom to get everything set. My class is of the kind that needs tight schedules, so I am ahead of myself a lot these days, getting things in place and planning every detail beforehand, and so I thought I had plenty of time to get the film up and ready to roll on the screen. The room is equipped with a laptop, a projector and loudspeakers, and the cables needed to connect the three. I know how they all work. The documentary I have in mind is easily found on nrk, and nrk never fails. Everything should be in order.

And this is where the chaos begins. I open the laptop. No power. Plug the charger in, log on. I open Google Chrome, type nrk + south african childhood in the search bar, find the right film. Press play. “You need Flash to view this. Install Flash here”. I press “here”, only to be informed that I have no authority to download anything on this network. Ahh, of course, everything is run centrally, so if I want a new programme on the computer, I have to ask some dude downtown. He knows what I need in my classroom, right? Anyway, I shut Chrome down, and try Explorer instead. It works! (Just don’t ask me why it works on Explorer and not on Chrome, when the film and the laptop are both the same!) Ok, so I have the film on screen … for about fifteen seconds. Then it stops, and my subconsciousness registers a tiny light on the wall above the door. It is red. It’s supposed to be green. I have no internet connection. My brain catches up on the information, and I run for the door. I go straight for the headmaster’s office, knowing that he’s the IT-brain in our school. He does a search, and eventually finds the problem; a carpenter working in the corridor has accidentally cut the internet cable. Long story short, they get it fixed. But not in time.

The bell rings, and my happy, noisy thirteen-year olds enter the scene. I have spent the last four minutes of break frantically (fruitlessly) trying to come up with a plan b – so I improvise, as one does. It’s ok.

Near the end of the lesson I can see the tiny light above the door turn green again. It means I have one more chance – it’s a double lesson. I let the kids out early, and give it another go. I find the film again, on Explorer, press play, and it plays. Oh joy! I plug the mini-jack into the side of the laptop, and check to see if the loudspeakers are on. They are. But I have no sound! I go to settings on the computer, choose “speakers”, turn the sound up on the computer, turn the sound up in the media player, turn the sound up on the speakers. No sound. Try inserting the mini-jack into my cell phone instead, and it works – WHY? I realize there must be something wrong with the sound-input. I run to find another laptop. While sprinting up the stairs, I ask myself if this is worth it. We could just start reading the texts in the textbook instead? But I know this film, THIS film, is going to give those kids such a start at this topic. I HAVE to make it.

Fast forward through those next few minutes, where silent cursing over hurried, misspelled passwords may or may not have taken place, and a crazy projector-directs-the-sound-to-it’s-own-speakers-instead-of-the-main-speakers-detour (with all the hassle that brings) may have happened: I am ready. These teenagers are going to see this film. In the last seconds of break, it all came together, and I glimpsed the beauty of computer, projector and loudspeakers, and all the connecting cables, working together in perfect harmony. Bliss.

Then the bell rings. The classroom transforms into a mass of sound and movement, and I am tranquil, serene, making them sit down, demanding their attention through my sheer will. I tell them we are going to watch a film. I tell them it will broaden their understanding of life in a foreign country. I tell them it will deepen their understanding of life itself. I tell them I have been to hell and back to be able to show it to them. I turn the lights in the room off. I draw the curtains. I hold my finger in front of my lips to encourage silence. I press play.

Then the power is cut.

Murphy’s law:

«Anything that can go wrong will go wrong»

I hope you will never know what I mean.

Goodbye.