8-13 The End of the World is Nigh!
I am sitting in the school office using the power here. It is the end of the term and grades are due, so a lot of other teachers are also around writing in their grades, marking papers and general taking advantage of having light in the evening.
Toussaint, the other computer teacher, just walked in. He heard on the radio that a meteorite is going to strike Mururoa, an island in French Polynesia. From what I can gather, that island has already been a nuclear testing site, so the island itself isn’t the issue. If the meteorite strikes the water, it will cause a 50 meter high tidal wave, which is just reason to panic around here.
Of course, all of the currently available information is coming from one, slightly kava-drunk, 20-something man. That is enough to cause a minor panic among the teachers and students. Not a real panic, just a lot of conversation and threats that the world will end. Of course, even with those, no one can be bothered to stop working on grades to go home to their families, so I guess they aren’t that worried.
For as much as I complain about the teachers in Melsisi, there are some people who are real jewels. Flavi is one of them. She is the year 9 and 10 science and math teacher. When some of the students came to ask about the rumor of the end of the world, Flavi whipped out her (brand new) laptop and opened a program she just got from the Ministry of Education about meteorites. She did an impromptu science lesson about meteorites and atmospheric entry for the curious students and teachers. Everyone seems much calmer now so whatever she told them made them happy.
I’ll let you know if the world doesn’t end. If it does, I’m sure you’ll have noticed.
UPDATE 8-17: The World Did Not End
As a shock to exactly no one, the world did not end last week. There was in fact a meteor shower going on, according to the calendar my mom sent me, but no large meteors were scheduled to get through. The day after that happened, I asked the teachers what happened to the meteor. Turns out the radio station was wrong. Again, this is a shock to exactly no one, since this radio station also reported that a ni-Van woman had a dream that told her where Bin Laden was hiding, which she then reported to the US military and that is how they found him. If you hear it on the radio, it MUST be true, right?