The next decade....what's in store?

Soaking saltfish...I think of Mrs Hollingsworth

Everytime I put saltfish to soak, it reminds me of my high school Chemistry teacher, Joan Hollingsworth.

She became famous for the wrong reason when her life was snuffed out by an unknown assailant at the ATM in Premier Plaza. Claude Mills interviewed her husband in 2003, four years after it happened.

Anyway, here is why I remember her....

She taught me from first to fifth form. She was a pincher....she would walk around and inspect our uniforms, and if there were buttons missing, or the pocket was torn, she would administer a pinch. Ouch! Anyway, one day in class, she asked about the concentration of salt in water. Her question was if a solution has x parts of salt to y parts of water, if you halved the mixture and then added more water to each half, would the salt concentration be the same?

I forget what the answer was but when I put the saltfish to soak, I think of the concentration of salt in the water, and then about Mrs Hollingsworth.

I went all through high school without a detention or demerit, and she was the only teacher who ever threatened me with one, when I was talking one day in class, while she was talking. Big mistake. Tears welled up in my eyes, because there was no way I could go home and tell my parents I got a demerit. Anyway, she only threatened.

I started carrying roses from Mummy's garden for her, in an empty jam bottle. She was always very thrilled. One day, she forgot it in the classroom. My next class was with another teacher, and in the same classroom. She walked back into the classroom, picked up her jam bottle and said "my rothe goes every where I go." (She had a list tongue). I will always remember that.

I hope she still has thoughts of my rose with her, wherever she is now.

Posted by yamfoot at July 28, 2007 08:49 PM