Real Madrid vs. Barcelona

the thing with the kids that would drive me nuts sometimes is that in the middle of the lesson, as i would be talking in front of the class, i'd see pairs of boys with decks of those stupid stupid stupid pokemon cards, shuffling them, sifting through them or better yet, standing up, facing one another and high-fiving each other with them every 10 minutes.  i'd storm up to them to say "you know i can SEE you right?" and take their cards away, sometimes they'd hand it over with a sly smile and other times they'd plead and beg, realizing that the teacher caught them when they had their BEST deck in hand.  and this is how I, Ms. Fahmida, started collecting my own growing collection of those stupid stupid cards.  I might have close to 500 hundred now, and once in a while, to entertain ourselves, Maggie and I play around with them, in the teacher's room, after making sure that there are no students in sight.  I really thought that by the end of the year, my little cubby in the teacher's room would be a explosive vault of just cards.

but i realized in the recent past, almost with a bit of sadness, that it had been a while since i had confiscated any cards at all.  or bouncy balls.. or toy cars.. or rubber sticky rats (which are just gross looking) .. or prank toys.. or little circular disks that pop up when you press down on them, or other obnoxious man made creations that make trying to teach hyperactive youngens a living  nightmare.  

my most recent confiscation however was a Real Madrid poster being swooned over by a bunch of 4th grader girls.  they had a mini heart attack when i took that one away. 

students here NEED to know which team i support.  randomly in the middle of class, or recess, they shoot up their hands or run up to me  to ask "TEACHER! Real Madrid or Barcelona??" i had looked at them with a blank face the first several times they did this, especially when kids that i had never seen before would run up to me, so interested in knowing my affiliation, because i had no idea what they were even  talking about or what they were saying to me (anyone and everyone who knows me in the slightest can vouch for my sports retardation).  i asked my roommate about this, and she told me "just pick one, they won't leave you alone until you tell them which one is your team".  the obessions with these two teams is really amusing, especially because the affiliation seems so arbitrary, especially to a little first grader in palestine.  So of course, and i can shamelessly admit to the fact that i've never watched a match, so i dont feel any guilt or betrayal doing this, i claim real madrid around real madrid fans and barcelona around the other fans.  my homeroom class was distraught because one group was taunting the other saying that i was on their side, and the other side retaliated going NO SHE'S ON OUR SIDE! and then when both looked at me..well that was just awkard.  i tried to make them laugh by saying "hey kids I'm Real Barcelona!".  no one found it funny. 

during one of my tutoring sessions, i told my student about this, and the 15 year old appreciated the humor in the awkardness.  but then i got stuck in another sticky situation; somehow as we were all laughing about this, and by all i mean my 15 year old student, and her 12 year old sister ,the two brothers, 16 and 14 also chimed into the conversation, asking if i was real madrid or barcelona.  i took their side.  then they asked Israel or Palestine and then after that it was "Fatah or Hamas?" and then that was time to shut up.  

speaking of these rivalries, M and I had a fun time explaining the nature of college rivalries to Gabriella during our Egypt time, who just stared at us puzzled and intrigued.  Maggie told Gabriella that to me, F, the shades of the color blue hold extreme significance, which of course led me to explain to her the distinction between Carolina blue and Duke blue, and that they are very very different blues, that there is no confusing them, one is the good blue and the other is the bad blue.  Someone chimed in saying "like Israel, their flag comes in shades, and its Carolina blue" which of course drove me bonkers because the Israeli flag is DEFINITELY DUKE BLUE.  Is that weird that the duke blueness of the flag gives me strange satisfaction? its definitely defintely the bad blue. 

the end. 

(p.s. sorry to anyone that though the title of this post meant that i actually went to see a real match or that i know anything about football ;)