The Killer
What a title? Who is the killer? Whom did he kill?
These short questions and similar ones must have come to your mind once you saw the title. Surely I will soon tell you about the killer but first I must describe the set up to this story. In fact this is a story which falls into the category of “My teaching days”.
When the killer appeared in my life, it was towards the end of my carrier as a teacher. I was one of three ‘art and crafts’ teachers in our secondary school. At school they called us the ‘three kings’ because all three of us had beards and we were always together. Besides myself, there was one of Malta’s best ever sculptors by the name of Anton Agius whose works, monuments and statues are all over the island. Then there was a relatively young teacher who was a very good artist too but he was the type to impose his ideas because they were always the best or so he thought. Several years before I retired, our friend (now late) Anton reached his retiring age and left. This created a vacancy and the other art teacher and I were eager to see who was replacing him.
On a Monday morning in December, after the daily assembly which was held in the school yard, all teachers who were in charge of a class for the first lesson went to their classrooms. Now the teachers who had a lesson free, went to the staff room. This was because no teacher had a specific classroom for himself. So the students always stayed in the same classrooms. But in our case and also in the case of science teacher, we had our own classroom because our classrooms required a different set up form the other rooms. So in our case the students came to our classes. The art teachers had their classrooms near each other. This fact made us stay in our classrooms when we had free lessons and we hardly ever went to the staff room. Moreover, as art and craft were not considered as main subjects such as English and Maths, we had a lot of free lessons.
On that particular Monday, after all the classes were settled in their respective classrooms and my colleague and I were in our own rooms without any children, the head of school came to my class accompanied by another man. The head of school asked me to tell the other art teacher to come to my class. In a few words, the head introduced us to the new art and craft teacher. Then the head of school left the three of us together.
Let me describe our new colleague as regards appearance. He was tallish but not as tall as I am. He was of normal built. His short cut hair was curly or wavy ……he did not have a beard. What struck me most was this very particular tick which was rather funny. Every now and then he would blink his eyes twice or three times very fast, shake his head and at the same time flick out his tongue like a snake. He dressed very casual; something I always did.
But you get to know a person by his body language and in the way he behaves and most of all in the way he talks. Our conversation started when my old colleague started to try to impose his ideas………in fact it was not a conversation at all because my young friend talked and talked, “ I have this ideas for Christmas. We art teachers can hold a Christmas Crib exhibition. So I suggest that we divide this exhibition in two sections……Traditional cribs, and Original cribs……… “He kept talking and explaining and explaining and talking. I knew him well enough to realize that it was all a show off to impress the new comer and show him how good a teacher he was. Before my friend the wise guy stopped talking, I could see that the new teacher was about to explode as he started to blink his eyes, shake his head and take out his tongue continuously to express that he was getting more and more nervous. Then in a loud exasperating voice he said, “Oh, oh, oh, if you are such a keen worker do it by yourself and count me out. They sent me here without me wanting it and I intend not to go out of my way……….you just gave me the worst welcome I could get. I know your type, you want to impress me, but you didn’t and you can go to hell my friend, for all I care!!!”
I was just a spectator all the time while this was being said but when our new friend finished, I could not help myself and I burst laughing so heartily that I couldn’t stop myself. My old colleague took it badly and left straight to his room. Then when the new comer saw me laughing in that way, he started laughing too. This thing sort of created a bond between us and from then on we became good friends. In fact I was almost the one and only friend whom he felt at easy with.
In a week’s time I learned several things about my new friend. He surely was an angry and bitter man. He was a political fanatic and his party let him down because as an activist he pretended better treatment which he didn’t get. He was not a teacher at all. His was a welder. As he told me, he spent several years in North Africa welding a long pipe line in the desert. Then due to some changes in the education system, several skilled workers applied for a job in the education department as technical instructors. He told me that he wished to be sent to a particular school where he thought that he could do practically nothing but they sent him to our school where he surely had to do a lot of things. He was quite a good craftsman but as regarding art, he admitted that it was never in him. I also learned that he was married and had two grow up children but his marriage was on the rocks for a long time and his children fended on their own.
When we both had a free lesson he would come in my class and start narrating his many stories……. some I believed but some, I did not. As he told me he had many enemies. His enemies were those who had a different political opinion and those who did not agree with him in any way. He would tell me how he dealt with his enemies. To scratch their car or if it was possible give it a couple of kicks were his first level of vengeance. Others who in his black book deserved a greater punishment, he would follow them discreetly, possibly when it was dark and he would use his baseball bat which he always kept in his car, to knock them down before they knew what hit them. He even told me that when he was in Africa, he had a big quarrel with a policeman there. This policeman used to pick on him and two other Maltese who worked there. Once the policeman followed them out of the village and into the desert, He stopped their truck and started to ask questions and annoy them. He told me that he gave him a good beating and left him half death in the desert and then they drove off.
I used to narrate his stories to my wife and I referred to him as ‘The Killer’. That’s how this nickname came about.
Once, when we were at school, he felt really sick. In fact he was red in the face and his eye balls seemed to pop out. He told me that he could not breathe well. At first I panicked but then I rushed to the head’s office and asked him to give me permission to take him to hospital. In fact in half an hour’s time, he was being examined and the doctor told him that he was at risk of having a heart attack. I stayed with him for several hours. Then he signed himself out and I took him to his home. I phoned a doctor friend of mine to come over and visit him. The end result was that he probably needed a by-pass urgently.
At that time of my life I was in the prayer group and in those circumstances, I felt that I should do my best as a good Christian, not only to help this lonely man, physically but also, spiritually. In fact I persuaded him to do what was necessary and even arranged for him to go to hospital to do the by-pass. Before the operation I took a nice friendly priest and he was glad to confess and as he said it was a long time since he was that happy. After the operation, which was a success, I used to go to visit him every day. He really got to love me and I suggested telling his wife and children to come and visit him. He agreed. His children were glad to see him but his wife would not listen to me. Anyway, he got better and better and in time he returned back to work.
This experience tamed the fierce tiger in him and he was now more reasonable and calm. At school, the other teachers noticed our friendship and through me he made friends with several of our colleagues. Spiritually he was now much better and often he would say that it was God’s will that he met me otherwise, who knows what would have happened to him.
Few years latter it was time for me to retire and he was really, really sad that I had to leave. But we kept in touch every now and then. About three years ago he also reached retiring age and he held a party in his new home because he had found a nice woman who loved him and they are living together. At the party there were also his children with their partners and three teachers including myself and our wives. When he sees me and talks to me he doesn’t call me by my name but he always refers to me as ‘my dear friend’.
Two days ago I received a phone call. At the other end of the line I heard someone saying, “How are you my dear friend?” It was my friend the killer. We talked about the results of our island’s general elections because we have the same political believes. We also fixed a date to meet and spend some time together.
I wrote this story about my friend the killer, as a result of this phone call as it inspired me about this episode in my life.
Quote of the day:
Faith sees the invisible, believes the incredible and receives the impossible.
What a title? Who is the killer? Whom did he kill?
These short questions and similar ones must have come to your mind once you saw the title. Surely I will soon tell you about the killer but first I must describe the set up to this story. In fact this is a story which falls into the category of “My teaching days”.
When the killer appeared in my life, it was towards the end of my carrier as a teacher. I was one of three ‘art and crafts’ teachers in our secondary school. At school they called us the ‘three kings’ because all three of us had beards and we were always together. Besides myself, there was one of Malta’s best ever sculptors by the name of Anton Agius whose works, monuments and statues are all over the island. Then there was a relatively young teacher who was a very good artist too but he was the type to impose his ideas because they were always the best or so he thought. Several years before I retired, our friend (now late) Anton reached his retiring age and left. This created a vacancy and the other art teacher and I were eager to see who was replacing him.
On a Monday morning in December, after the daily assembly which was held in the school yard, all teachers who were in charge of a class for the first lesson went to their classrooms. Now the teachers who had a lesson free, went to the staff room. This was because no teacher had a specific classroom for himself. So the students always stayed in the same classrooms. But in our case and also in the case of science teacher, we had our own classroom because our classrooms required a different set up form the other rooms. So in our case the students came to our classes. The art teachers had their classrooms near each other. This fact made us stay in our classrooms when we had free lessons and we hardly ever went to the staff room. Moreover, as art and craft were not considered as main subjects such as English and Maths, we had a lot of free lessons.
On that particular Monday, after all the classes were settled in their respective classrooms and my colleague and I were in our own rooms without any children, the head of school came to my class accompanied by another man. The head of school asked me to tell the other art teacher to come to my class. In a few words, the head introduced us to the new art and craft teacher. Then the head of school left the three of us together.
Let me describe our new colleague as regards appearance. He was tallish but not as tall as I am. He was of normal built. His short cut hair was curly or wavy ……he did not have a beard. What struck me most was this very particular tick which was rather funny. Every now and then he would blink his eyes twice or three times very fast, shake his head and at the same time flick out his tongue like a snake. He dressed very casual; something I always did.
But you get to know a person by his body language and in the way he behaves and most of all in the way he talks. Our conversation started when my old colleague started to try to impose his ideas………in fact it was not a conversation at all because my young friend talked and talked, “ I have this ideas for Christmas. We art teachers can hold a Christmas Crib exhibition. So I suggest that we divide this exhibition in two sections……Traditional cribs, and Original cribs……… “He kept talking and explaining and explaining and talking. I knew him well enough to realize that it was all a show off to impress the new comer and show him how good a teacher he was. Before my friend the wise guy stopped talking, I could see that the new teacher was about to explode as he started to blink his eyes, shake his head and take out his tongue continuously to express that he was getting more and more nervous. Then in a loud exasperating voice he said, “Oh, oh, oh, if you are such a keen worker do it by yourself and count me out. They sent me here without me wanting it and I intend not to go out of my way……….you just gave me the worst welcome I could get. I know your type, you want to impress me, but you didn’t and you can go to hell my friend, for all I care!!!”
I was just a spectator all the time while this was being said but when our new friend finished, I could not help myself and I burst laughing so heartily that I couldn’t stop myself. My old colleague took it badly and left straight to his room. Then when the new comer saw me laughing in that way, he started laughing too. This thing sort of created a bond between us and from then on we became good friends. In fact I was almost the one and only friend whom he felt at easy with.
In a week’s time I learned several things about my new friend. He surely was an angry and bitter man. He was a political fanatic and his party let him down because as an activist he pretended better treatment which he didn’t get. He was not a teacher at all. His was a welder. As he told me, he spent several years in North Africa welding a long pipe line in the desert. Then due to some changes in the education system, several skilled workers applied for a job in the education department as technical instructors. He told me that he wished to be sent to a particular school where he thought that he could do practically nothing but they sent him to our school where he surely had to do a lot of things. He was quite a good craftsman but as regarding art, he admitted that it was never in him. I also learned that he was married and had two grow up children but his marriage was on the rocks for a long time and his children fended on their own.
When we both had a free lesson he would come in my class and start narrating his many stories……. some I believed but some, I did not. As he told me he had many enemies. His enemies were those who had a different political opinion and those who did not agree with him in any way. He would tell me how he dealt with his enemies. To scratch their car or if it was possible give it a couple of kicks were his first level of vengeance. Others who in his black book deserved a greater punishment, he would follow them discreetly, possibly when it was dark and he would use his baseball bat which he always kept in his car, to knock them down before they knew what hit them. He even told me that when he was in Africa, he had a big quarrel with a policeman there. This policeman used to pick on him and two other Maltese who worked there. Once the policeman followed them out of the village and into the desert, He stopped their truck and started to ask questions and annoy them. He told me that he gave him a good beating and left him half death in the desert and then they drove off.
I used to narrate his stories to my wife and I referred to him as ‘The Killer’. That’s how this nickname came about.
Once, when we were at school, he felt really sick. In fact he was red in the face and his eye balls seemed to pop out. He told me that he could not breathe well. At first I panicked but then I rushed to the head’s office and asked him to give me permission to take him to hospital. In fact in half an hour’s time, he was being examined and the doctor told him that he was at risk of having a heart attack. I stayed with him for several hours. Then he signed himself out and I took him to his home. I phoned a doctor friend of mine to come over and visit him. The end result was that he probably needed a by-pass urgently.
At that time of my life I was in the prayer group and in those circumstances, I felt that I should do my best as a good Christian, not only to help this lonely man, physically but also, spiritually. In fact I persuaded him to do what was necessary and even arranged for him to go to hospital to do the by-pass. Before the operation I took a nice friendly priest and he was glad to confess and as he said it was a long time since he was that happy. After the operation, which was a success, I used to go to visit him every day. He really got to love me and I suggested telling his wife and children to come and visit him. He agreed. His children were glad to see him but his wife would not listen to me. Anyway, he got better and better and in time he returned back to work.
This experience tamed the fierce tiger in him and he was now more reasonable and calm. At school, the other teachers noticed our friendship and through me he made friends with several of our colleagues. Spiritually he was now much better and often he would say that it was God’s will that he met me otherwise, who knows what would have happened to him.
Few years latter it was time for me to retire and he was really, really sad that I had to leave. But we kept in touch every now and then. About three years ago he also reached retiring age and he held a party in his new home because he had found a nice woman who loved him and they are living together. At the party there were also his children with their partners and three teachers including myself and our wives. When he sees me and talks to me he doesn’t call me by my name but he always refers to me as ‘my dear friend’.
Two days ago I received a phone call. At the other end of the line I heard someone saying, “How are you my dear friend?” It was my friend the killer. We talked about the results of our island’s general elections because we have the same political believes. We also fixed a date to meet and spend some time together.
I wrote this story about my friend the killer, as a result of this phone call as it inspired me about this episode in my life.
Quote of the day:
Faith sees the invisible, believes the incredible and receives the impossible.