Molding
As days pass at school, Chinese kids are molded into that ideal collective functioning together with the purpose of conquering the King’s English. Miss Doyle, the General of the class, teaches kids to have their feet flat as an iron against the floor, pro-nun-ci-a-tion lessons and brings the world to them trough a Neilson Chocolate Map of the World….They learned about wars and victories taking place far away, where nobody killed each other, but where those involved in the battles dealt with “rescue”, “courage” and “kindness”.
Sek-Lung experiences that there weren’t many chances for anyone living in Canada to be truly brave, since the bombs were falling down in London, not in Vancouver…he dreamed about killing the enemy himself someday….as well as Kiam, the day he became Canadian, the day he wasn’t a resident alien anymore.
Children at Miss Doyle’s class needed extra attention, the class was meant for immigrant kids who knew too little English, or who could understand English but not read it or speak it well, or who for whatever reason were starting late…therefore, they needed extra attention…but for how long?
Miss Doyle also wanted to protect that mixed bunch of immigrants and displaced persons, to teach them to be bravery…the outside world mocked them, ignored them, and urged them to “say it again”: What? What’s that you say? Can’t you speak English?...so that they belong at last to an including-all-country. They were equals within the class. That’s what they believed.
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