He meant butt-face.

Posted on by Deems

*All names used in this story are pseudonyms*

You hear the weirdest stories on a playground. One day, a little third grade boy was trudging towards his destination (the foe), with eyes full of tears and fists full of anger. I followed him because somehow I knew this wasn’t going to end well. Macho man was now kicking another boy in his shins. He knew what to target. I ran up to break them apart and calm them down. I asked both boys what happened, and each one had a completely different story. Peter wanted revenge from Jack, and had no idea why Peter wanted revenge. Frustrated and ready to go to war, Peter screamed: “MISS HE POKED ME IN BOTH MY EYES!!” I thought Jack would try to defend himself and convince me that he didn’t. Instead he said: “Yes, yes I did.” I asked him why he did, and he claimed that Peter and his posse came up to him and his posse and said: “YOU’RE BABIES AND WE’RE SUPERMAN!!” I wanted to tell them that Superman was only one guy and that they couldn’t all be superman at once, but I decided not to bring up any sensitive topics. Peter denied any such thing. Next came Ryan; who belonged to Peter’s posse. Poor guy was really hurt and demanded justice. It was his turn to tell me what happened, he said: “MISS ABUSHABAN JACK TOLD ME I’M THE FACE OF HIS BUTT!!”

“In other news, butts have faces……”

I was pretty sure Jack meant to call him a butt-face, but that’s beside the point. After a long talk, both parties came to an agreement.

AGREEMENT: Kick each other’s shins and try to insult each other when Miss Abushaban is off duty.

Problem solved.

LIGHTBULB!

Posted on by Deems

This story is not about a lightbulb, it’s about lightbulb moments. Now, usually when someone has a lightbulb moment, it’s a moment of absolute brilliance, in most cases at least. I say most, because it’s never the case for me. Nope. Quite the contrary actually. My lightbulb ideas are trash. They are my moments of absolute confidence, but extremely questionable brilliance. So much confidence that I actually yell “LIGHTBULB” while shooting my hand up with a pointed finger to make sure that anybody who doesn’t hear me screaming lightbulb surely sees my hand shoot up. I like to target all types of learners, from auditory to visual. I call it inclusive education. Posting this story on the internet – the place baba says things become immortal – is a great example of my questionable brilliance. 

For the past four summers, I have had the privilege of organizing, and assisting with camps for newcomer youth. This summer there was the added challenge of navigating a global pandemic; it’s no big deal. Anyway, I was explaining a game to a coworker of mine, who I’ll call Selah. Selah means to pause, reflect, and return your gaze to God. I mention this because Selah does a great job of pausing, reflecting, and returning for the both of us whenever we’re together. Selah, unlike myself, has true lightbulb moments, and as a result, constantly recognizes the extremely questionable ideas I have. 

On this day I had one of my best extremely questionable ideas; it was generated as an attempt to modify a game to meet COVID19 protocol. The game requires every player to tuck a  bandanna into their waistband. However, one of the protocols discouraged the sharing of equipment; in other words, no two players could touch the same anything. This meant that a kid could not tuck their bandanna into their waistband, because another kid would have to snatch it, and that is two kids touching the same thing. So, after recognizing this obstacle to the game, Selah and I began brainstorming ideas to find a way around this kerfuffle:

Deema: “LIGHTBULB!”

Selah: “Great! Let’s hear it!”

Deema: “Instead of the kids tucking their bandanna into their waistband themselves, why don’t we put gloves on and TUCK IT IN FOR THEM???”

Selah: *Remains silent while staring right at me waiting for me to reflect on what I just said, praying under her breath that I am not the pervert I sounded like seconds earlier*

Deema: “You know what? Maybe that’s not a GREAT idea. Definitely not one of my best.”

Selah: “Really, why so? What’s so wrong with tucking things into kids pants for them?”

Deema: *sensing the sarcasm is Selah’s voice replies* “That’s enough.”

I’ve been feeling quite insecure about my lightbulb ideas ever since. They’ve been lacking brilliance, common sense, human decency, and have been morally and ethically questionable. So, I’m taking a break for now. Pretty lightbulb material if you ask me. So, if we’re ever together and I yell LIGHTBULB and shoot up a hand, proceed to ignore me, or be like Selah and listen, pause, reflect, and return both our gazes to what’s important.

I now end every lightbulb moment I share with someone by yelling “JUST KIDDING SIRI”. You can never be too careful as a woman of colour with the middle name Mohammed wearing a hijab.

LIGHTBULB! We can all learn to be a little more like Selah, and a little less like Deema.

The Tale of the Pencil Sharpener

Posted on by Deems

You know those pencil sharpeners from the late 1800’s? The black and silver ones that sharpen pencils the same way you would roll down a manual car window. Yes, the one that just popped in your head is the same one I had to use to sharpen hundreds of pencils in a grade 1 classroom these past couple of months. The blisters I would get on my hands were those of professional gymnasts, or monkey-bar enthusiasts. Little did the world know, I was none of the above, I was simply a student teacher trying to win over the love of twenty-three students by sharpening fifty pencils a day, on average. There was one student in particular that always wanted me to sharpen her pencils. Sometimes I think she would break her pencils on purpose. Who am I kidding? I know she broke her pencils on purpose. I will refer to this student as Viola. One day, Viola approached me differently about sharpening her pencils. She approached me looking like she just watched a season finale of Grey’s Anatomy. She wasn’t crying, but she looked distressed and in shock:

Viola: “Mith. Abushaban, can you pleathe sharpen my penthil?”

Miss. Abushaban (overly-enthused, as per usual): “Of course, let’s get these bad boys all sharpened up!”

Viola (following in a scurry): “Thanks Mith. Abushaban!”

Miss. Abushaban (now at the scene of the crime – the pencil sharpener): “Viola, is this your hair?”

Viola: “Yeah I think so. I felt something tugging at my head.”

Viola lost a lot of hair that day. Her hair got caught in the pencil sharpener, and she completed at least a solid five rotations of pencil sharpening before realizing that the sharpener from the late 1800’s was doing the wrong job. This is how people get Sharpener PTSD.

My heart goes out to all the Violas out there.

*All the names used in this story are pseudonyms*

I’m Back!

Posted on by Deems

It has been far too long, but I’m back with a ton of new stories up my sleeve. I started this blog in 2015, while I was volunteering at a school assisting fifth grade boys with English reading and writing. Three years later now, I am in my 6th year of postsecondary school, studying to become a teacher, and I have that volunteer experience to thank. That was the start of my journey to becoming an educator. At the time, I was an architectural engineering student lacking sleep and essential nutrients. Today, I am a student at the University of Lethbridge completing a combined degree in Kinesiology and Education, with a minor in religious studies, still lacking sleep and essential nutrients. You are now wondering what religious studies and kinesiology have in common. The answer is, nothing. It’s like trying to find similarities between a shawarma and a pogo stick, Voldemort and Dumbledore, or my sister and I. Nothing in common. However, they are both things I really enjoy, and that’s all that matters. Also, that’s one thing they have in common, so I lied.

Ever since I last posted, I have completed two professional practicums at different schools in Southern Alberta, Canada. Meaning, I have met many more little people, and as a result, have a lot more stories, because kids are hilarious. So, I hope these short stories will make you laugh and wonder as much as they made me laugh and wonder.

Happy reading!

Day 53: A legitimate hate towards reading.

Posted on by Deems

My job at this school was to help teach little kids how to read. Today my story is about Student E; one of the little boys I helped with reading. Halfway through one of our stories, he stopped me and told me he hated to read and asked me if we could stop and play a game. I agreed, but asked him why he hated reading so much. He said: “Miss, I don’t like it. That’s it.” So I told him to bring a book of his choice for our next lesson, and suggested “Diary of A Wimpy Kid” because I assumed all kids around his age group (ten) liked this series. He then replied: “Miss, I can’t. I burned all my books yesterday. Diary of A Wimpy Kid was burned too.”At this point I was looking at him in disbelief and in my head I was taking a couple of steps back. He could’ve easily just kept them on a bookshelf; or maybe thrown them in an attic if he really wanted to play dirty (it’s a dusty attic). I didn’t exactly know what to reply. I simply closed the book and started a friendly game of hangman. Student E loved hangman and burning things. Sounds like something you’d extract from a criminal record. We didn’t read much after that. It was a personal choice…..

Accidental Ding Dong Dashing.

Posted on by Deems

I’m not the type to have plans every weekend, or the type to want to go out after work; today however, I had plans. Really good plans if I may add. I was going to “Timothy” Hortons with my sister, and two of my very good friends Janaynay and Sara Bara. We were going straight from the school I work at, so Janaynay (Jana) needed to go home and get ready. Lucky for us, her house is right next to Tim Hortons, and she was kind enough to welcome us into her home while she got ready. Jana and my sister Reem went up before Sara Bara (Sara) and I because we had to put coins in the pay meter. A stubborn pay meter that doesn’t accept “new” coins. I spent five minutes trying my best to make my new shiny coins seem as old and matte (dirty) as possible by scraping them against the pay meter’s dirtiest parts………(it worked). After paying, Sara and I made our way upstairs. I had never been to Jana’s house, but Sara had. The elevator opened and we were on her floor. I asked which door belonged to her house and rang the doorbell. As we were standing there waiting for someone to open the door, Sara and I were admiring the decorations in front of it. Flower petals, religious ornaments, and wording that looked English, but definitely did not sound English. Didn’t seem like something Jana’s family would put…… After maybe two minutes of admiring the decorations with faces that read “This is hella Buddhist”, a lady opened the door. This lady was not only dark-skinned, and looking extremely irritated with a forced smile across her face; she was also not Jana’s mom and we were pretty sure it wasn’t Jana either. She definitely wasn’t from the same part of the globe, let’s put it that way. So we figured either Jana has an adopted sister we never knew about, or this was simply the wrong door. After a lot of deep thinking, Sara Bara and I decided we ding dong-ed the wrong door bell, apologized, laughed hysterically, and walked away. Still laughing, we made our way to the next door, rang it, and waited for Jana. As we were waiting, the elevator made a stop at our floor, and out came Jana’s mom; except (funny story) she was not walking towards the door we were standing at, she was walking towards another one; this my friends is when we knew we had once again rang the wrong doorbell and sprinted with Jana’s mom into the right house. At least Sara and I were on the right floor…… Her mom was nice enough to make us a delicious lunch before we left. Food that completely pummeled Tim Hortons Chili (sorry Tim). God bless home-made food and good company.

Day 51: Extremely Cheat-y.

Posted on by Deems

Ying Hao and I had one on one reading together today, or at least I’d like for it to be a reading session; we spend the forty-five minutes telling stories. Well, he tells the stories, I just sit and listen to them. Today the story was called “Ying Hao and Mario Cat”. It’s a tale full of action and adventure. Mario Cat is supposedly a game you can download on your smart phone, and I know that because Ying spent our walk down the stairs forcing me to download the app, and I spent the walk down trying to convince him he was saying it wrong and it was actually called Mario Kart. Anywho, the words “Mario Cat is extremely cheat-y!” kept coming up in the story; that’s definitely not what it sounded like though. He had trouble pronouncing “ch” and instead pronounced it as “sh”. We’re working on it. So, throughout the story I kept telling him he was being impolite. I mean Mario Cat couldn’t have been that bad. The poor kid had no idea why I wasn’t enjoying his story, and kept interrupting him and calling him ill-mannered (in the nicest way possible). After I finally understood what he was saying, even though “extremely cheat-y” isn’t really something people say on the daily basis; “Hey there! Did you hear about that guy at work that was being extremely cheat-y? Boy oh boy was he getting away with a lot.” I started to look a little more interested in the story line and cracked a couple smiles. Mario Cat is killin it in China.

Day 50: The Little Einsteins.

Posted on by Deems

I’ve gotten very comfortable guarding the gym door now. No one un-gym-like was getting into the gym on my watch. I’ve made a new friend on the playground. Little Mohammed and I conversed almost every morning; we told each other everything. We talked about our likes and dislikes, and bonded over our love for cheese. Today little Mohammed and I were guarding the gym door together. I was humming the theme song for the Disney Junior cartoon “Little Einsteins”. He recognized what I was humming, which is normal because he’s an eight year old boy who is still socially allowed to watch Disney Junior. He looked up at me and asked:

“Ms. Deema, are you humming the theme song to the Disney JUNIOR cartoon “Little Einsteins”?”

“yes, yes I am.”

“Well can you please stop now? It’s getting a little weird. How old did you say you were again?”

“20.”

Little Mohammed (with an expression of utter disappointment): “Mhmm.”

This was the end of our conversation. Little Mohammed finished his breakfast and walked off…..

Was it something I hummed?

Day 41: False Impressions.

Posted on by Deems

Spring break is over and school is back in action. I had a morning duty today. The playground was pretty empty because most of the kids were probably still on vacation, or more accurately: didn’t want to come. It was not less than thirty five degrees celsius; keep in mind it was only nine o’clock in the morning. I was guarding the gym door, again. Kids would come up to me (because I guess I looked “very high in temperature”) and ask me why I won’t go into the gym to get some cool air. The kids were concerned for my health. Fatima started to show up again, and we were now back to our day to day routine. Step one of the routine was her “surprising” me; but the only difference in the routine, today, was that I didn’t have to act, because today Fatima actually caught me by surprise. The weather was really hazy…… My teacher friend was now approaching to say hi, and was in a hurry, so she walked behind Fatima and quickly put out her hand to give me a high five (her hand was above Fatima’s head). So I quickly put out my hand to complete it (I didn’t want to leave her hanging). Fatima didn’t notice the teacher behind her, and didn’t know I was greeting anyone. So, she ducked as fast as she could and looked at me surprised; then she noticed me wishing a good day to the teacher as she was walking away. Fatima thought I tried to slap her and ducked to save herself from the ‘wrath of my palm’. Soon she realized I was only high five-ing my friend that was standing right behind her a couple of seconds ago. I honestly don’t think I look like the type to slap children across the face. I hope the kids on the playground share the same thought. Minutes later, both Fatima and I were laughing about what happened and went on with our lives. Darn you false impressions!

Cinderella.

Posted on by Deems

My family and I went to watch Cinderella over the weekend. Typical princess story, but not a typical princess story audience. It was a sold out show, and luckily we got really great seats; but when you’re buying your seats online, or picking your seats on a screen, you may know where you’ll be sitting during the movie, but you can never guarantee who will be sitting behind you, in front of you, and even sometimes beside you. My family is really big on previews, so we were there just about when the cinema’s doors opened. We saw almost everyone walk in after us. There were guys walking in that looked like complete thugs; like if they walked in on a theme song, it would be: “I come from gangsta ga gangsta…” To my luck, I got a kicker behind me, and an incredibly large individual in front of me. To my sides, I had my lovely brother and sister. My brother was the one asking questions to my right, and my sister was the one kind enough to answer to my left; I was the one in the middle watching the movie. I don’t know why, but we always end up sitting in the order we were born; coincidentally, of course (that would be super ultra weird if it were planned). Anywho, the kicker situated behind me had brought her chair-kicking, curious about anything and everything, typical, approximately eleven year-old diva companions. Joy. They felt the need to comment on every scene. When Cinderella was trying on the glass slipper, it was: “I hope her feet don’t smell!” When Cinderella was dancing with prince charming, it was: “I hope they get married!” When Cinderella was singing out of a window, it was: “WOW! She has such a nice voice!” I understand that Cinderella is a princess, which makes her comment-worthy, but these little girls were pushing it. It, and my buttons; if I may add. This was a really long movie. One hundred and twenty minutes. It was Butt-numbingly long. Two hours of continuous comments, incredibly large individual, and kicking. Other than that, it was fantastic. It had a true “fairytale ending”. Cinderella lived happily ever after, and so did we.

The End