Troublemaker

A student was sick for the midterm and was sent home so I let him take the exam. I'd had trouble getting help reserving rooms so I first suggested he come to my apartment thinking he could work on the test in the living room while I was on my computer working in the bedroom. I'd proctor and confiscate any electronic devices. He was a bit put off about that. I considered reserving a classroom, but it's taken three weeks to get a room to watch the second half of a movie.

Then I thought, I can do this in the library. I had popped into the library a month ago out of curiosity. Our requests in the spring for a tour were all passively aggressively denied. I just looked around the periodicals room briefly before the sentry figured out how to get me out.

So I met my student in front of the library and casually sauntered past the sentry, who did stop my student to find out what was going on. The student apparently explained and I did hear the sentry use the word for foreigner. We breezed into the periodicals room and I told Hector to sit at a table. I gave him the test and began to catch up on my reading with one eye on my student. Soon the sentry reappeared and talked with the woman whose job it is to sit by the door to the periodicals room and watch students read. Much of the time she seemed away from her post.

I have no idea what they decided, but the guard then stood outside the periodicals room and glared at me. Eventually, he went back to the entrance. You know, if I were working with the other foreigners they could have all sneaked into the library and gotten up to the books on the third floor. Anyway, Hector finished the test 90 minutes later. Though he's usually good student and he could choose the day to take this, he did very poorly. Still a 71% sure beats 0% and by the end of the term, he can improve.

I remind myself that this guard has a mind-numbing job and this kerfuffle with the foreigner gave him something to converse about with his pals.