The idea of conferences is the same in Hungary, though the actual event is much much different. Each teacher is set up in a classroom- and since they don’t have their own classrooms, there is a posting of where each person is at the front door. So after a lesson with Csenge, I was dropped back off at school. I had my backpack and the bag of materials for Csenge and a Vince Flynn book in hand. I stopped inside the doorway to look at the assigned rooms (knowing I wouldn’t have one) for a few minutes. As I stood there, a man approached me from the side and said, “you might be interested in this…” My immediate reaction was “how the hell do you know I speak English?” I hadn’t announced myself, I hadn’t spoken to anyone, I wasn’t saying anything – how did he know? His response was “you’re Carla right? I knew because my students told me you read wherever you walk, and you have a book in hand.” As I was processing this information, I realized how creepy this actually was. He is a young guy who works at a local language school and specializes in placing Hungarian teens in American homes for a year of their high school career. I couldn’t get over his identification of me though - a book told you? A book? Also, of all the things your private students could have told you about me as an American and as a teacher, they told you I read when I walk? That’s it? I suppose it’s better than other things that could have been said. At any rate, I was a bit of a nomad since I didn’t have an official classroom. So I decided to join the creepy language school recruiter at the front table. I made a sign that said “I am Carla Staffa” and I waited.
As I sat there, I noticed that many parents walked by the table and looked at the sign and smirked. It was as if a small light went on over head and they could put a name to a face finally. They smiled with recognition as they passed, and I was a bit frustrated that my Hungarian isn’t better than it is because it caused a bit of nervousness among the parents. Later on though, I had a number of parents who came to talk to me. I had “conferences” with 5 Hungarian speaking parents and 4 English speaking parents. Ultimately, it was a slow showing for the two and a half hours of conferences by my count – meaning those who talked to me – but I was glad that I was there for those who wanted to speak to me. Also, I can’t really complain because two and a half hours pales in comparison to the 18 hours of conferences we have at Burnsville!
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