Primary School

Franciscusoord was not a big school; there were about 200 children, about 40 of whom were on secondary education. It was far from that far for me in the early 1970s; I was still in primary school. I don’t remember much about the lowest classes. It was a time for me when I often saw more hospitals from the inside than I wanted to and sometimes had more contact with the doctors than with the teachers at the school.

All of this changed a lot when I was in the fifth grade of primary school. In that class Miss Jet held sway: she was strict but fair. She was assisted by a class assistant who took care of the physical care of the children. This situation was normal for every class: there was always a teacher and an assistant present.

I liked Miss Jet; a feeling that hardly anyone shared with me. At least, when I think back to that time, I may well put it that way. I can still picture her as if it were yesterday: a classic example of a schoolteacher like you saw in the 60s of the last century. Short, somewhat graying hair, subtly make up and clothing that you would expect from a woman from her ‘stand’: classic and decent. She was a schoolteacher who expected a lot from you and did her best to provide you with all the help you needed to meet her expectations. Besides being serious, she was also very creative and musical; especially the latter she tried to convey to her pupils through weekly music and singing lessons. The latter in particular was a real torment for me – and even more so for my classmates. I was always happy again when that lesson was over and I had not received a singing solo. But she also showed her creative side in other ways: during birthdays for example. Then she came up – often in collaboration with the assistant – of all kinds of games and fun assignments for the students to give them a day that was free from the usual learning goals. But of course the reverse happened just as often: when it was the assistant’s birthday, she cooked up all kinds of things with us to put her in the limelight.

In Miss Jet’s class, the assistant listened to the name José. For one of Miss José’s birthdays, under the supervision of Miss Jet, we made a kind of barrel in which all kinds of fun assignments were put in. Of course we came up with the assignments ourselves, that goes without saying. All assignments were aimed at putting Miss José in the limelight.

On the big day, we had to take turns to dig into the barrel and carry out the assignment that was written on the note. When it was my turn to fish a piece of paper out of the barrel, I digged seriously and somewhat anxiously into the supply of notes. I opened the folded sheet of paper and read aloud, “Wash Miss José’s feet.” Everyone was laughing, of course, except for me. But I decided to be brave. Miss Jet stood next to me, with a towel, washcloth and soap in her hands. As if it were a daily chore that I did every day, I put her feet on my lap and started my task with water and way too much soap. Her feet were definitely clean after that because I had used so much soap that the foam was only really gone after three or four rinses.

Although I was the last to do an assignment, the day was certainly not over. Miss Jose had also come up with something. In the classroom there was a large table that on ordinary days was mainly used for eating together or for other communal activities. But now it had a large bottle filled with marbles. The assignment was very simple: you had to guess how many marbles were in the bottle. I have no idea what the prize was to be won, but what I do remember is that I was the only one who guessed the correct number. That was not difficult, because the day before, Miss Jose sat at that table counting the marbles and I heard the last number she mentioned. I suspected it had something to do with her birthday so I remembered that number. So it was cheating a bit, but of course I never told anyone.

The games that Miss Jet invented often had an educational background. For example, I can remember a game where we had to make a sentence with a few words she handed us.

Ik weet nog dat ik de woorden “juffrouw José”, “leukste” en “niet” kreeg. Well, what sentence should you make of that? I was groggy but couldn’t figure it out. colleague assistant who walked in knew the game and whispered a sentence in my ear. The sentence read: “Miss José is nice but she is not the nicest.” Oh dear, what did I do now? What a horrible sentence. I actually thought Miss José was the nicest assistant; even from the whole school! But I had no alternative, so I said the sentence in a shaky voice and not convinced at all. Miss José looked at me as if she was angry and went on with her work, supposedly insulted. When I then had to be taken care of by her and we were alone together for a while, I told her that I had not meant that at all, but just couldn’t say anything else. She happily let me know that she understood and that she was not angry at all. That was quite a relief for that young lad, who was really crazy about “his” José.