Before graduating highschool I have come to realize that I wanted a job that can touch lives and shape futures. So I considered getting a course that could give me the opportunity to improve my skills to help me achieve this seemingly impossible aspiration. My first choice was Secondary Education. But by some twist of fate, I landed into the list of Mass Communication freshies two years ago. Had I known that the entrance exams at Philippine Normal University were over even before I decided getting one, I would not have been here and you would not be able to read this. Perhaps it was written. This must’ve been God’s will.

I thought that being a teacher would help me achieve my vision to bring a simple yet valuable impact in the lives of others. I should know, because I’m a product of two math teachers. Education brought me into this world; it fed me and helped me become me. My whole existence mirrored a teacher’s impact to the society, into the future and to the lives of the most successful people on earth. I was able to study in a prestigious Catholic school without having to spend much on books and fees. I was never ill treated for my father is the most loyal and most trusted member of the academe. My schoolmates looked up to me and my teachers expected a lot from me.

For years, I was nannied by Mommy’s female students whose faces I do not even remember now. Our flowerhorns, Marlin and Dory, and even our seven Kois and orange Janitor Fish (whose names change every so often) enjoyed free or discounted food from a pet shop owner who was also taught by my father. I watched in shock as my mother marked my gay friend’s card with a red pen. Then I heard that a doctor visited Daddy when he was undergoing radiation therapy for his cancer. It turns out that the doctor, who was working in the same hospital, was my father’s student years ago in a 5^th grade Science class. Everywhere we go, we find people who, at some point in their lives, have received valuable learnings from my parents which helped them achieve their success.

In my opinion (I’m speaking as a student here of course), there are two types of teachers in the world. First are those who shower us with knowledge who aids us in coping with life in the most graceful way possible. She could be your kindergarten teacher who taught you how to read and helped you hold your pencil properly. He could be your Statistics professor who gives all the formula needed for the whole exam or the swimming coach who ensures that the water is high enough before you dive in so that you don’t lose your head in the process. He could also be the professor who goes around the campus to find your class a room conducive for learning because the campus isn’t enough for 24,000 students. They teach you all the things that you’re supposed to know because you’ll be needing those in your chosen field without making it too hard for you to handle and more often than not, you love them.

The second type of teacher leaves you wisdom which helped you see reality in such a way that you’d have to go through a ring of fire. It could be your elementary madam who hits you with a stick whenever you forget to cut your fingernails. She could be the teacher who demanded that you color all the body parts and draw all the animals in the forest. Maybe he’s the professor who refuses to let you speak in Filipino during his class, making you spill buckets of liquid when you recite. She could be the official who reprimanded you for breaking the rules of the university or the teacher who would not entertain your ideas just because of her personal frustrations in life. They teach you the things that are not included in your curriculum but are actually more important than your lectures for these are the lessons which would shape your life no matter what field you are in. They impart experience beyond monetary capacity by demanding a lot from you all though most of the time, they were hated.

I’d have to say my mom would most probably fall on the first category while my dad could go into the second. And yeah, maybe a lot of my teachers could go to the 2^nd as well. Let’s admit it, our lives have become both hellish and interesting since we started schooling. We’ve discovered stress and cramming and the endless, sleepless nights of project making. I have learned that it is possible to create two dokyus in 3 weeks time just as long as we keep the coffee coming when we sleep over classmates’ houses. I learned that when a teacher says ‘no’ it means ‘shut the hell up’; and that when they say ‘yes’ you better thank the gods for that. I learned that some teachers prefer smart students; some favor those who give efforts in everything they do despite the fact that they’re not academically good; while some like dumb learners who would believe everything they say even if they really have no idea what they’re talking about.

In one of Paolo Coelho’s novels, he said there are little difference between a teacher and his disciple. Authority aside, the only difference between them is that a teacher has more courage than his disciple. He has the nerve to learn more even if it means that he has to risk something important. He braves the difficult days as an educator without thinking about the graces he’s bound to receive afterwards. And I realized, while watching Susan Roces in May Bukas Pa, that being a teacher is one of the hardest jobs in history. They may have been spending their whole lives switching rooms, getting to know students, talking all day long and giving out assignments but those are much more easier said than done (I know, I’ve been a student teacher when I was in highschool). We spend 2/3 of our days inside classrooms making us more exposed to learning from our teachers more than our parents (in my case, it works both ways).

Yeah, maybe some of them are really hard to deal with—okay most of them. But then again, a few years after graduating you’d see them somewhere and realize that if it wasn’t for them you wouldn’t be exactly who you are right now. They did made you cry, they did humiliate you, they did make you wish the earth could swallow you whole, but then that’s what learning is about. It’s about experience more than lectures, about ‘finding out’ more than ‘just knowing’. You may be suffering now from 5 projects and a thesis but 5 years after graduation you’d end up earning for a living. One day, you might find yourself in the hospital realizing that you just met your 1^st year professor in a wheelchair and asking her about her breast cancer. That’s when you know that you did learn.