Ayer, gasté tiempo en mi clase de español.*

1. Hola, la profesora says as she enters the room in a tidal wave of books.
‘She’s a character’, George on my right whispers. Really Spanish.
I consider the tall, gangly woman, the trousers at the ankle and the too-short sleeve, the wiry shoulder-length hair and matching grey cardigan, the yellow socks, but I can’t see how the teacher is really Spanish. In fact I remember having an English teacher at school cut out on the exact same pattern..
It’s a look, you know.
The pile of books crashes to the floor. The six of us look at one another, half amused, half worried.

2. Communicative grammar, she says in heavily accented English, is about learning grammar in context. She seems to have forgotten about the books, doesn’t introduce herself, doesn’t seem to care about our names. I was all poised, ready for the customary speech about my likes and dislikes, pets, favourite colour, shoe size and possible allergies. She’s clearly not interested. On with a military-style drill. Communicative, then.

3. So we’re practising the perfect tense. Sally next to me claims to have eaten a pussy last night. For a minute I believe she’s saying she’s talking about oral sex, and cheer silently inside both at her linguistic prowess and her candidness; but it transpires that she merely got the verb the wrong way round and fed her cat. Disappointment.

4. We’re subjected to 3 hours of an intense lack of organisation and focus. Clearly this character never plans a lesson, and has no idea how to engage her students. This is going to be a struggle. La profesora gives us homework for next week and offers to prolong the class by 15 minutes, but we all have somewhere to be.

5. ay ay ay ay, amigos. Wish me luck.

*yesterday, I wasted time in my Spanish class.