The school now reminds me of something else…

30/08/2008 by April First.

Upon due reflection and after a third day working for the New Regime at school I have reached the conclusion that working for military intelligence was rather like working for the school. Everyone in management runs around in a flap creating problems, while admin first define the problem and then make up solutions to what we define as the problem. The point of it all is always the same: the problems don’t exist by themselves – they are invented and defined. We then have a choice – we either accept their definition and solve that issue, or we reject their definition and throw it back in their faces. (I like that bit).

This is of course all far too complex for any school manager to grasp, and I suspect far to sophisticated an analysis for military intelligence too. But it is everyday stuff for administrators.

Mrs Bland came into the office and gave us a talk on how the school was to be a model of co-operation, as we all moved together meeting the aims of the school to which we all subscribe. We were also told that we should not talk about the workings of the school at any time to anyone – even colleagues. Any issues or problems (and it was clear that she expected there to be none) should be reported to her, and her alone.

I have come across organisations like this somewhere in history, but I can’t quite think where.

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Nothing happens; chaos; I could enjoy this

29/08/2008 by April First.

My second day under the new school regime, and a real boost.  It seems that the chaos that is rampant throughout the school which Janice and I have so carefully nurtured in the past year, is as vibrant as ever.  For all the bluster and pomp, for all the re-writing of history New Progress really don’t seem to know what they want or how they want it. 

Which means once again the Administration is in Power and Control.

But the New Progress people are expert at making it look like they know.   Everyone who works for New Progress is incredibly smartly dressed - power dressing I think they call it.  As if the way you dress affects how good you are at your job!

Doors are closed - locked even - as if this seems to signify that one is working hard because the door is closed.  Twice I asked for clarification during the day, on an issue where I was supposed rewriting (”updating and correcting”) the record of what happened last term and each time I was told that there would be an answer shortly.   There hasn’t been.

The pupils and students return next week, and I am not sure that we are going to be able to cope.  All sorts of new updated systems have been promised for the running of the school, but none seem to be working, and I have not got a clue what I am supposed to be doing - other than waiting for the crumbs of information that come out of the room of Mrs Bland - who actually seems to be controlling everything.

I have been told to send out a press release.  Dutifully I prepared the script I was given and according to instruction emailed my copy (which was in fact just the copy I was given before) back to Mrs Bland.

Two hours later I received an email telling me that the copy was completely unacceptable and would need re-writing.   So I didn’t send it.

In a rather strange way I think this might turn out to be quite amusing.  Especially when Janice comes back to work. 

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A new force occupies the school

28/08/2008 by April First.

A return to school – and what a return. Exactly as predicted by my new employers in military intelligence everything has changed. We have a new headteacher: Mr Putin. Of Mr Berlusconi there is no mention and no record. Amazingly people can hardly even remember his name – and Mrs Marchmount actually said, “isn’t he the prime minister of Italy or something?”

Likewise there is no sign of Columbus – the company that took over our local authority, nor of the local authority. Instead we have a new power to whom we are answerable: New Progress.

Upon arrival I was not allowed into the office, but had to present myself at the door my Mrs Bland, my new senior manager. There being no reply at the door I sat and waited, and was about to start flipping through my new MI5 handbook when I noticed a CCTV camera trained on me. I slipped the book back into my bag, silently cursing myself for making such a basic error on day one.

Eventually Mrs Bland emerged from her room and invited me in for what turned out to be a lecture.

Things, she said, were changing in the school, and indeed I would find that the new regime had already made significant progress in turning around the corrupt old system. (I was about to ask a question but it became clear that questioning the statements of Mrs Bland was similar to questioning the authority of Mrs Bland and that in turn meant questioning New Progress – which meant that I had then sacked myself).

The new academy, as the school is now known (although I am certain that we have never applied for or been granted Academy status) would be a model occupation of the school. (I looked up sharply on the word occupation, but Mrs Bland seemed to see nothing wrong with her vocabulary.)

It would be a model of co-operation between the new forces occupying the school and those of the old regime who were still in place (that seemed to include me).

In essence, her talk said, we don’t talk about it. And with that I went about my work – which seemed to involve reconciling what I thought happened last term with what New Progress wanted written in the official record. Janice was not there, so I had no one to talk to.

In the evening I hoped for further contact from military intelligence but there was none. I felt alone, an isolated agent in a foreign land.

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I prepare to enter my new role in life

27/08/2008 by April First.

Spent the morning reading up on military intelligence.

MI1 it seems belongs to the director of military intelligence. It is also the home of the cryptography unit – which the file helpfully pointed out was the transformation of data in order to hide its information content, prevent its undetected modification, or prevent its unauthorized use. MI2 was responsible for Russia, the Baltic States and Scandinavia, while MI3 was responsible for Germany and Eastern Europe.

That then took me naturally onto MI4 which controlled eye-view reconnaissance (which apparently meant surveillance by the old method of following someone around) and MI4 itself came under MI5, domestic intelligence and security. As I already knew,

MI6 handled the overview of foreign intelligence and security, while MI7 looked after alien invasions and general activity from beyond the sky. I was glad they had that covered.

I studied the rest of the list and set it aside. Somehow having access to this information seemed to have put me at the heart of our country, for, I reasoned, if the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is about anything it is about knowing what is going on. And I felt I knew.

And if I didn’t I soon would.

As I put my files away in the broom cupboard under the stairs I reflected on the fact that by and large this birthday was the best birthday I have had. Not only had military intelligence accepted me, that evening I had taken my best friends to the regular Saturday evening dance (or “bop” as we Dancers call it), at the Rat and Hedgehog in MadDogs Avenue, and wowed them with my newly acquired skills. True to their promises earlier in the week, several gentlemen from the dance classes were there and they were able to lead me through a myriad of steps. Oh how I floated. Oh how they admired my skill. I am even quite looking forward to a return to work.

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At last my talent is recognised

26/08/2008 by April First.

The bank holiday weekend, and my birthday. 19 cards, plus phone calls from the family. The one from my Aunt Melina was apparently in Klingon. I phoned to ask for a translation but she was out. Aunt Melina is currently appearing at the Hippodrome as a knight trapped within a mechanical game invented by a seven-year-old. I suggested to my uncle that this sounded more like a pantomime than a summer entertainment. He agreed with a sigh, but said, “you know what your Aunt is like.”

But much more to the point, among saturday’s post I received, to my utter amazement, astonishment, delight, glee, general enhancement and I must admit a certain level of tension and apprehension (aren’t emotions complicated?), a letter from MI6. They expressed considerable interest in my application and suggested that I called them at once. I phoned at 10.03am and was told by one Wayne Hellinger-Sztompke that a field officer would visit my house at 10.15am. I was advised to keep the matter completely secret, so I am deliberately not writing this in my diary.

A Mr Roger Beshears turned up at 10.16am, apologised for being late but said it took him longer to walk down the garden path than he had anticipated.

I invited him in, offered coffee, offered a biscuit and offered to listen.

“You work for Mr Berlusconi ,” he said. I was about to deny it when I remembered that was the name of our headteacher. “When you return to school he will no longer be there. We are gathering data on his successor wish you to work with us. You will be assigned to MI17.”

“I thought you were MI6,” I said. “Foreign intelligence and security.”

“How do you know that?” he asked looking around cautiously. “Have you been approached by… others?”

“I’m just impressive,” I told him. “And I looked it up on the Guardian web site. That’s why I applied – overseas surveillance. I have been practising my dancing.”

“Dancing?” he asked curiously.

“A woman can pass herself anywhere if she knows enough dance steps,” I told him with more certainty than I felt. “What is MI17 Mr Beshears?”

“Administration,” he replied, adding, “call me Roger”.

“But I am already an administrator,” I said.

“An excellent qualification,” Call me Roger replied. “You are ideally placed. I look at you and cannot believe you are not really an administrator at all. You know how to administer, and I have heard on the climbing plant you are brilliant at the task. You will be in charge of co-ordination of data received, collating reports, and returning them to me.”

“No dancing?” I asked.

He confirmed there would be, as far as he could see, no dancing, although stranger things, he suggested, can happen to those of us inside military intelligence.

“But why are MI6 interested in Mr Berlusconi’s successor ?” I asked.

“That, of course, is secret, but I can tell you that the request has come from MI9. You will find your school changed.”

“Who are MI9?”

“Clandestine operations – escape and invasion.” He spoke in a tone that suggested surely I, as a respected member of MI17 would know that. I gave a nod to suggest that of course I did and was just testing him out.

I asked if there was a list of all the MI’s. “In your briefing pack,” he said, handing over a ring binder from his case. “Study it well, keep it safe. You live here alone?”

I told him I did, hoping he didn’t check the electoral roll. At the last count there was 86 in the broom cupboard. “The assignment,” he added “is to find out about the people running your school, as well as what happened to Mr Berlusconi . You will gather data and forward to me.”

I then suggested to my visitor that MI6 was surely already pretty much up to speed on the issue of how schools worked, and that if not they could ask the Department for Cushions and Soft Furnishings. Surely us worthy servants in MI17 had more we could offer in other fields. Whatever is happening at the school now is probably just a case of a lack of nutritional value in the custard and outbursts of swine fever among certain teachers.”

“I didn’t know that,” said Call, getting interested. Despite myself I had let myself get onto first name terms. “I knew you would be a first class operative. “File me more reports and we will get on famously.”

“But how?”

“You should wear your hat,” Call told me. “Would you like to come out for a meal tonight?”

I told him I was going dancing.

“I liked your notion of casual vandalism as a hobby,” Call said reminding me of what I put on my application form. “But we also need to know about the missing money from last term.”

“I like to keep up appearances,” I said.

“I’ll see you at the dance tonight then,” he said.

“What missing money?” I said.

“Do you jive or Salsa?” he said.

“But you don’t know which dance I’ll be at.” I said.

“The £2.5 million illicitly taken from the DfES,” he said.

“Ceroc,” I said.

“You can rely on military intelligence,” he said.

“We’re talking code, aren’t we?” I asked, “answering questions before they are answered,” but he was gone. I rushed down the garden path. “Where do we meet?” I asked breathless.

“At funerals,” he said.

“Any particular sort of funerals?” I aseked.

“Funerals of Romanians.”

“In Britain?”

“Yes.”

“Aren’t they hard to find?””

“That’s the point.”

I bade him goodnight, feeling rather impressed. I appear to be a spy. And MI17 does seem to have a certain ring.

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Summer hols

21/08/2008 by April First.

And so I went on holiday.

It was, in essence, a stunner.  Slovenia is an incredible country which I cannot hope to describe, but here’s a few bits.

First, you can’t get England’s national dish (MacDonalds) there.  That, for me is a good start.  There are virtually no fast food outlets at all - no KFC, Burger King or anything.

Second it is beautiful beyond compare - I stayed in the Julian Alps, at Lake Bled, and it looks like a film set.  Even when I fell into the lake (my first adventure into an Alpine lake in fact) it was fun and not nearly as cold as I thought.
Third,  the music.  Bled is a small town, but every night there are at least two, sometimes four, free musical events going on.  From Irish folk music at the bandstand to two guys playing 1950s rock on guitars in the shopping centre.   Live music is what Slovenia seems to live for, and it is utterly wonderful.   Of course if you don’t like live music, then the place loses its appeal, but if you enjoy cafe society with scenery that looks like it was painted into a 1960s movie backdrop (castle at the top of a mountain, that sort of thing) with real people playing real music that they love to an appreciative audience, this is the place.

And there is the friendliness.  And the fact that the three year olds speak English.   Plus all the usual stuff to see (the caves are particularly beyond belief - mile after mile of underground caverns with stalactites and the stuff that goes the other way - they have trains that drive through the caves so you can see them).

One of the most amazing things was the music from Macedonia.   I have to admit I wasn’t too sure about it - knowing that Macedonia was next to Greece, and that personally I am not a fan of Greek music (all that plate throwing), so I sat by the door ready for a quick exit.   But a Macedonian band turned up to play one night in the Festival Hall.  (This is a town of 5000 people and it has a magnificent, modern, festival hall, that puts on free concerts).  It was utterly sensational.  A choir of 11 women, and a band of 7.    Beyond anything I have ever heard.

Stupidly I didn’t have enough euros with me to buy the CDs so I am still searching on the internet to be able to get a copy.   Macdeonia looks like being my next destination, although I did meet this Irish guy who suggested that Waterford would suit me down to the ground if it was folk music I wanted, and he had a spare room in his apartment.  But I think I will stick with Macedonia - and a lot of recommendations to everyone I know that they should go to Slovenia.

One little word of warning.  I went to the Post Office to buy Euros before setting out, and was told (and indeed shown on an official PO notice) that Slovenia’s currency was not the Euro but in fact the Flavian Pibble Bead.   This is untrue.  They are an EU country and they have the Euro.  Couldn’t be easier (except of course that we are not in the euro and so the exchange rate is really naff - that was why the Irish were having such a great time - no problems with an exchange rate).

Go there - if you like people who don’t shout, don’t argue, where there are no police cars racing by with sirens blaring, where everyone looks healthy, where the weather is great (4 days of sunshine, one night of violent lighting, one day of cloud and then repeat), where everyone speaks wonderful English, where the national dish is the cream cake…

On Monday I am back to school.  Hey ho.

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