Jamaican Bad Words

Jamaican Bad Words

by

Austin Mitchell

           I was in total shock that Jack Kerber, our peace corps volunteer and woodwork teacher, told me a Jamaican bad word. Now I know Jack, he had been at Mc Kinley High for a little over a year. He was a straight shooter and wasn’t afraid of expressing his opinion. We were in a meeting me, him and David Butler, our sports master. Jack suddenly got up, cursed and went outside. David looked at me as he left the room.

                “What did you do to annoy Jack now, Watson?” he asked me.

                I gave him a blank expression.

                “Nothing, I didn’t know that he knows bad words.”

                Jack returned to the room and we continued our meeting.

                When the meeting was over I repeated the bad word he told me. He simply said that it meant that he wanted to be excused from the room.

                David burst out laughing and I managed a chuckle. Jack saw the expression on our faces and asked us for an explanation. We told him what it meant. He told us that all the boys used it especially when they wanted to be excused from the class.

                I gave Jack a small tape recorder to keep on his person. For almost a week nothing happened then into the second week he told me that he had something. I listened to the tap and heard some choice Jamaican language. Incidentally there were two girls and three boys who got taped. I recognized their voices. I called them to a meeting and played the tape for them to listen. The two girls were in tears. But the boys said that they meant nothing by it and were just playing a prank on Jack. I knew it was a serious matter and I told them so. Suppose any government official or the police had been passing the classroom and heard those expressions, not only they would have gotten into trouble but the school would have been disgraced. We told Jack that some of the words the offending boys and girls used to him, they would not dare use them to anybody on the streets. As a matter of fact they couldn’t use them to their very classmates.

                I let them go with a warning that any repeat and I would take the offender to the principal. I knew that now that they realized that Jack was on to their pranks they wouldn’t dare repeat it. Nevertheless, either I or the dean of discipline was always walking the corridors looking for the trouble makers, especially from that class.The End. (Adapted from the collection of short stories-I' Back From the Hills Now by Austin Mitchell). Please visit the Austin G Mitchell pages at Amazon for a look at my books.