Caning kids

When I look back on my school years, I think I must have some multiple personality disorder, consider my discipline record. Until I was ten I lived in England, I was only in trouble once as I recall, and it was more like a teacher explaining to me why my behaviour was wrong and that it should never happen again. It didn't.

On arriving in Adelaide, I met my first supreme arsehole. Duggan. Probably the worst teacher I have ever known. He split the class up into Australians and migrants and made jokes about excluding black people from Australia and worse. He had a cupboard full of canes and used one of them on me each and every week. His little sadistic ritual, was to have the boy (girls were never caned) select his own cane from the cupboard. If Duggan thought the cane was too thick, the child, the ten year old child, was sent back for another. Thin canes hurt more. My mother gave him an earful on my last day after seeing the red welts on my hands and fingers.

I started High School in Victoria and thoroughly enjoyed my time there. I had good friends, lots of Air Force brats like me, all obsessed with aviation like me. The move to Ipswich in Queensland took me to Bremer High School. I must have liked it because, we moved house shortly afterwards and I travelled a ridiculously long way to and from school. Sometimes I walked. When Armstrong and Aldrin walked on the moon, I ran.

I was caned on two occasions at Bremer High School. Once as a new boy I tagged along as some other kids took off early from a sports afternoon. The principal caught us, and three days later caned all five of us. The second caning is a longer story.  We gave ourselves different names in the group we ran in. Not nick names, new first names. My best friend was called Boris, and to this day 45 years later, he calls me Gus. Anyway, Miss Wedd was our English, English teacher. She was known for her picky and idiosyncratic, ways. She once corrected a friend for saying a TV personality was 'gorgeous'. "No he isn't, he's white!" She insisted.

On this particular day she asked us to write down the names of ten characters from Macbeth. I started writing and wasn't counting, so I ended up with twelve names. Boris and I marked each other's list. Boris ticked (US checked) each name and signed 'Boris' after each one. We had to show hands as to who got 10, 9, 8 and so on. I being a smart arse, didn't put my hand up and fluke of flukes, she noticed. On inspecting our lists Miss Wedd gave us a choice, write an essay on Lady Macbeth or see the principal. I would have been happy to write the essay, but Boris didn't like Macbeth as much as I did. So we chose the principal. Hadn't we just exceeded her expectations and done even better than she asked for? What could he object to? As she was writing the note for the principal, she said, "You can hand the essay in on Monday". When I objected she spoke the words as she added to the note. "Paul seems to think that this is unfair."

Mr Bell the principal, caned Boris once and me twice on the right hand, I know which hand it was, as to this day the knuckle on my right thumb aches occasionally. And I still think it was unfair. I was told later that when it was proposed that I be a prefect, that I caused a huge rift amongst the teachers. A third of them arguing strongly for, a third strongly against and a bemused remaining third wondering who this Paul Hannah is.