by JayasankaranKK
Education is what you have left over when you subtract what you’ve forgotten from what you learned.
A long time ago, my father woke me up early because, as he explained, I had to “go to school”.
But he’d not prepared me sufficiently because when he woke me up the next day, I was incensed: “What, again?”
Schooling takes time, doesn’t it? There’s the 13 years in primary and secondary school. There’s four years of university and ten years later, a post-graduate stint in the US.
What remains after all that is what pedagogists call “an education.” In my case, it’s lots of information about inconsequential things: not very useful stuff. In my wife’s succinct precis, I am “a sewer of useless information”.
Don’t get me wrong: it has its moments. Jeopardy and word games spring to mind. I’m also a dab hand at Trivial Pursuit.
On hindsight my degree – biochemistry – was a mistake. It steered me towards a job in healthcare. When it comes to a hospital laboratory, that can be seriously debilitating.
Running a laboratory in a hospital is, literally, a bloody job. And four years of it can drive you to think: either Urine or you’re out!
Journalism was a relief. It was when, like Mark Twain, I never let “my schooling interfere with my education.” It was when I finally moved from cocksure ignorance to thoughtful uncertainty.
I’ve learnt a few things. Your vocation isn’t a matter of degree because life itself is the teacher. Experiential living may be all anyone needs.
Journalism saved me because all the lessons might have turned me into a learned idiot. According to Ben Franklin, that’s grim: “A learned blockhead is a greater blockhead than an ignorant one.”
On an unrelated note, Ye Olde English isn’t half-bad, no? Blockhead is nicer, and more humorous, than idiot.
I forgot to mention that enroute to Ipoh Hospital and journalism, I spent a year teaching high school chemistry, math and general science.
Sexism, again, reared its ugly head and being male, I was assigned the “problem” classes, the ones where the Neanderthals outnumbered homo sapiens.
You should never allow the type into any laboratory. One day, I was teaching a Chemistry class a procedure that involved Bunsen burners.
These were the portable types that were attached to their gas source by fasteners that looked secure enough.
Not to the Neanderthals, they’re not. One “rocket scientist” sitting in the back had the patience of Job and used three spatulas to prove that no fastener was secure when confronted by the Curious Cro-Magnon (early species of human).
And, yes Houston, there was lift-off – 10 minutes before the bell rang.
Luckily his burner wasn’t lit but it missed fracturing the said Cro-Magnon’s jaw by a few centimeters. The sound of its takeoff was frightening and the smell of gas was enough to cause cardiac arrest: there were naked flames around!
I yelled for everyone to get out and, together with the lab assistant, shut off the burners without incident.
Half the school was outside the lab by the time we emerged, sweating profusely.
Admittedly, not my finest moment. Not by a long shot.
It could have been worse, but the headmaster didn’t seem grateful. No, icy would be the word. He wanted to know if I planned on a career in teaching.
Bad form. Very.
Meanwhile, Mr Cro-Magnon was suspended: he was delighted, which seemed to miss the point altogether.
Woody Allen probably had him in mind when he quipped: “Some drink deeply from the river of knowledge; others merely gargle.”
This happened over 40 years ago, and I don’t know what happened to the Inquiring Gargler.
But I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s a Member of Parliament today.