You may ( or may not ) know that I work at a special character school. While I hold no especially strong religious views - it's no bad thing to work at a religious school. In a lot of ways it's pretty nice. There are times when it sticks a little in my craw - Christmas is a good example. There are days when I want to run through the school screaming "Christmas was stolen from the pagans ! Nowhere in the bible does it say when Jesus was born ! Don't even get me started on the Council of Nicea !".
Easter is another time.
Our school holds an important Easter assembly / chapel service kind of a deal. The students have to wear there formal uniforms all day - which, considering the bizarre mirco-climate of the school ramping temperatures into the 'please-someone-scoop-out-my-brains-through-my-nose-with-a-soup-spoon-so-I-don't-have-to-endure-this-miserable-HEAT!' range, is far from a pleasant thing.
Also, not only is it a day on 'assembly' times ( where the normal timetable is hacked into a tattered mess, which sucks - because students never remember the NORMAL times ), but the times are extra-mangled because the assembly had to be at the end of the day ( kids have NO freaking idea of what's going on ). So - yay for that.
Anyways - the assembly. Oh dear oh dear oh dear.
As I was saying - the Easter chapel service is supposed to be a fairly serious thing. This one was off to a fairly deep start - with reflections on the nature of sacrifice, scenes from "The Passion" ( man - I am NEVER watching that movie ) and various other spiritually uplifting things.
And then one of the student leaders was talking, and pulled out a medium sized easter egg. It's the size of, oh, half a rugby ball. Y'know - not huge.
This student says he going to break up the egg and hand it out to SOME students - because there isn't NEARLY enough for everyone ( which really - should have set off warning bells in this student's mind RIGHT THEN ). Maybe he thought this was a brillo way of demonstrating the nature of sacrifice. If so - this theory was severely flawed.
So - as there school captain comes forward, two seniors start to hand out these bits of chocolate.
What happens next ? Oh - I saw it coming. I think you do too !
Pande-FREAKING-monium !
Students are crying out, some literally screaming, for a miniscule amount of diary milk ! ALL over the auditorium ! And it wouldn't stop ! The Chaplain growled at the school over the microphone, with the principal scowling his disapproval at his side. "This is an important part of the school calendar ! Show respect for your fellow students" and other such platitudes were fired into the assemblage , but with NO change to the chocolate-infused frenzy !
"Give me some chocolate!"
"Hey! Over HERE!"
"Gimmie !"
" I WANT SOME !"
"MEEEEEEE !!! Some for MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!"
So much for Christian sacrifice !
Seriously - I've never seen anything like it happen in an assembly in my ten years of teaching.
In the end the remaining chocolate had to be removed FROM THE AUDITORIUM for them to settle down again. It was insanity !
I tell you - BEST. Assembly. EVER !
