Foot-long #3

I was told by the school on Thursday, from what I heard, to substitute on Friday for the second period. Well, I heard wrong, and I arrived about 20 minutes *late* (9 am), and after getting called by the secretary, to my chagrin. :(

Anyway, just as I arrive, they informed me that "the bus is just about to leave." Wha-? What bus?

Well, as soon as I hopped onto the bus, it took off with three other ones. All these buses were filled with secondary 1 and 2 students, heading to some religious community center, a building in Sillery, not far from the church and cemetery. Funny enough, I was the only other adult on the bus other than the bus driver... *PANIC!*

"HEY MISS C!!!"
"So... uh..." I stammered. "Do you know where we're going?"

The kids laughed, and I was told we were heading to a sort of leadership conference, organized by a number of different English organizations in the community. There were both QHS and St-Patrick's HS in attendance, at the same grade levels.

But imagine that, 300 squealing and squeamish high octane kids running around and screaming and fighting... with 1 adult per 30 kids... Fortunately, the secretary told me that everything would be potentially taken care of at the conference, with more adults and volunteers in attendance to watch over the kids and participate with them in the activities planned.

At first, the teachers didn't have much to do because we weren't really told anything other than get the kids there and back. Then they realized that the kids didn't listen to anybody (depending on the activity) because they were discouraged by the activities being offered, so they asked the teachers to follow the students to keep some peace.

I was assaulted with a barrage of "HI MISS!" to "MISS! HI!!!" to a lot of crazy kids trying to pilfer the teachers' coffee/tea/juice. Some even got it in their heads that they were there to cause as much misery to their rival schools that they booed each other in presentations of awards.

Fun, for a leadership conference, eh?

I got home in one piece, which is good enough for me... *GASP*