Mr. Hoshi
Miss Kawano retired after three years of her reign, and Mr. Hoshi took over our class. He preached like hell.
At the end of the day, before we were dismissed to go home, we usually had a class meeting for about 15 minutes. The class leader of the week had the kids to report noteworthy matters or to instruct the class on what to bring the following day. When that was all done, the teacher was called to conclude the meeting. Mr. Hoshi was never, ever, happy with us. He always had things to preach about, whether they were about our academic progress, behavior, or just about us being children.
He’d make us stand up and ask a rhetorical question, “why can’t you do anything right?” I am sure he referred to something specific, but that something was almost everything, so I can’t recall exactly what he was so riled about. I probably can’t remember it because I had spaced out each time. I am pretty sure others were, as well, hoping it’d end as soon as possible so we could go home.
The preaching often lasted over 1 hour. I had taken a public bus to and from school. The bus only came once an hour, so I was looking at the clock, calculating the walking speed to get to the bus stop. The bus time passed. I was thinking of playing in the schoolyard while waiting for the next bus, then the time for the next bus also passed. My legs were tired from standing, but Mr. Hoshi was still yelling at the class, who had zoned out a long time ago.
Mr. Hoshi didn’t physically hurt us, but his controlling method was similar to the indoctrination by totalitarian government or a religious cult.