Chapter 43: Chinese Teacher Part 1
Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
A melodious bell rang out, and the quiet campus suddenly livened up. Crowds poured out from the buildings, and it was full of life everywhere.
Yang Yan was looking down to gather up her textbooks and papers when her friends ran over. “Yang Yan, since class is over, let’s go shopping at Victoria!”
Yang Yan smiled and shook her head. “Not today, Professor Schecher asked me come to his office.”
“Aww.” Her group of friends were very disappointed.
Liu Wei picked up a football from his own desk, held it on top of his head, and tried to scare Yang Yan. “Better be careful, I heard that old Schecher likes to use a talking-to as an excuse to call young, pretty female students to his office for indecent behavior… Oh my!”
Ali shoved him away.
Yang Yan laughed and said, “Ah, Liu Wei, do you think everyone else has a filthy mind like you?” Then she said to her friends, “Go enjoy yourselves, never mind me. Professor Schecher can’t stop once he starts talking. I don’t think he’ll let me go in less than half an hour.”
After her friends said their goodbyes in disappointment, Yang Yan waited for another 10 minutes before she got up to go to Professor Schecher’s office.
Professor Stanley Schecher’s office was on the third floor of the university’s main lecture building and the fourth room on the east side. And Yang Yan’s classroom was on the second floor of this building.
The professor’s office door was wide open, so Yang Yan gave a cough in front of the door and then gently knocked. The deep voice of Professor Schecher came from inside. “Please come in.”
Only then did Yang Yan go in.
When the old professor saw it was his student, he stood up from his seat and dropped his glasses in his pocket.
“Professor Schecher, I’m here because in the previous class, I violated…” Yang Yan had just opened with the mental script that she had spent half a day on, when she was interrupted by the professor’s raised hand.
“Yang, do you know? You were very lucky that day.”
“Oh? Why?”
“Because your encounter was with me, not Professor Pazler.”
Yang Yan was even more confused. Professor Pazler was widely recognized as a good man. He usually had a smiling face and kind appearance. Even if he ran into a student, he would be polite in his greetings, and his appearance was meticulous. He was what a lot of girls thought of as a “charming, older gentleman.” On the contrary, Professor Schecher, the man in front of her, was strictly known as “Professor Devil”, a term the students used behind his back, of course. Why was it better to run into him than Pazler?
Seeing the doubt in Yang Yan’s eyes, Schecher smiled. “It’s very simple. Pazler, that old man, is a loyal Notts County fan. If he had caught you reading the Forest manager interview in his class, I bet he would have torn up that newspaper on the spot. In Nottingham, Nottingham Forest and Notts County are mortal enemies.”
Yang Yan felt that lying was not very nice, so she had to tell the truth, even if she was scolded by the professor. “Professor… I’m not a Forest fan. In fact, I’m not even a football fan. I’m sorry.”
She lowered her head after she spoke and waited for the punishment.
But she heard bigger laughter. “Of course. I know you’re not a fan. If I don’t know my students, how can I teach you? I read that newspaper later. What surprised me was that fellow, Tony, turned out to be such a fanatical follower of the Eastern culture.”
Yang Yan listened to the professor’s tone. It was as if they had known each other for a long time. She had questions in her heart, but she did not dare to ask them.
Professor Schecher was so excited that he did not notice the puzzled expression on Yang Yan’s face.
“You see, this world is so amazing. I like Nottingham Forest, the manager of Nottingham Forest likes Chinese culture, and you… are from China and my student.”
“It’s really amazing,” Yang Yan laughed. She thought, If I told you that I was a tour guide to the manager, and he gave me his phone number, hoping that I would be his Chinese teacher, you would be even more amazed.
“So, you don’t have to worry that I’ll punish you. You can go now.” Professor Schecher extended his hand to see her out, and Yang Yan was eager to do so. She said goodbye and turned, but was stopped again.
“Oh, Yang. I think you should give this little football thing a try. I swear you’ll like it.”
“I will. Thank you, Professor.”
On the way back to her apartment, Yang Yan still could not help laughing aloud at the thought of everything she had just encountered. If Liu Wei had not thrown the newspaper to her but had borne the responsibility himself, maybe he would have rambled on to show off his good personal relationship with Professor Schecher this afternoon.
Yang Yan decided to relate this to Liu Wei and let him go crazy with jealousy.
When she passed by a newsstand, Yang Yan’s attention was caught by several newspapers placed in the front row.
The newspapers were all different but had one thing in common. Yang Yan skimmed through and saw that familiar name: Tony Twain.
Not knowing why, Yang Yan stopped and picked up a newspaper with a lot of photos.
It was the biggest-selling newspaper in the United Kingdom, despite its less than stellar reputation, The Sun.
The sports section had been turned to the front. Apparently, this was a promotional tactic to attract passing students to buy. The newsstand owner knew which sports were the most popular in the United Kingdom, and what kinds of sports young people liked best.
On the left section of the newspaper, there were several similar-sized photographs, neatly laid out like a four-frame comic strip.
All four photographs had the same view, focused on the technical area below the stands. Tony Twain, wearing a black suit, was the main subject in the photographs. He had different expressions and actions in each photograph.
In the first frame, he had his arms raised up high, and he was grinning with the jubilant crowd behind him. The caption was simple: “At the thirteenth minute, 1:0.”
In the second one, Twain was swinging his leg to kick toward the water bottles at the sidelines. Whether he kicked them or not, Yang Yan would never know. The caption read: “At the forty-fourth minute, 1:1.”
The third frame showed Twain hopelessly waving his hands. The caption was: “At forty-eighth minute, 1:2.”
And in the fourth frame, with a furious expression, Twain was throwing his jacket to the ground in a very exaggerated manner. The caption read: “The end of the match, the Forest team loses.”
The headline of this news picture was: “Tony Twain’s Match.”
Looking at the pictures of Twain, whose expressions were so rich that he could be an actor, Yang Yan thought this person was rather interesting. When they first met, he left her with a refined and polite impression, completely unlike the angry manager in the photograph.
Maybe Liu Wei was right. A man who was a professional football manager could not always be a polite and calm gentleman.
This reminded her of Professor Schecher, whom she had just met alone. The old professor always looked so serious in public, and he appeared to be so exacting and demanding of everyone that he was almost unreasonable. There were only a few students who did not curse him behind his back. But Yang Yan had the privilege to see a completely different Professor Schecher 15 minutes ago, which was an eye-opener for her.
She turned to read the newspaper again. Both Professor Schecher and Manager Twain could show completely different sides to their personalities, and the reason for this was football.
Chinese teacher…
Maybe it’s good to have a part-time job, occasionally.
At Twain’s messy bachelor pad, newspapers were thrown all over the floor, which made the already horrendous indoor environment even more appalling.
These newspapers were almost all one-sided criticism of Manager Tony Twain’s match tactics and on-the-spot direction. Angry rebukes, sarcasm, and whatever contrasting means were used. It really was the old saying “Laughter and anger are arbitrary in all articles.”
“These media sons of b*tches!” Tang En was holding The Sun. Although the newspaper had printed the least words among the news reports about him, that unique ‘four-frame comic strip’ style report clearly had a mocking tone, very thick and strong, like the Italian cream of mushroom soup he ate last night.
“Damn! When I won a match, you licked my *ss one by one and said I was the best manager, young and promising. I lose one match and here comes all the criticism!”
Yes, all the criticism came. From the way Twain chose his players to the Forest team’s persisting with the new style for these last few matches, they had all become the reasons for which the media criticized him. In particular, Twain’s insistence on “high-efficiency football” was ridiculed as “high-failure-rate football.” It was not surprising that Tang En was so annoyed. It was also this group of media, during Forest team’s five-match winning streak, loudly proclaiming that this fast and efficient football was in line with the development direction of modern football.
Of course, what made Tang En the angriest was not others’ disapproval, but to see that these people criticized him so publicly without restraint and completely irresponsibly with their words. He had no way to counteract. In fact, he had many retorts and opinions for these b*stards, but there was no way to say them. To ask the club to hold a press conference for this matter? That would be making a mountain out of a molehill.
Infuriated, Tang En was pacing around in the house. It was no use telling others about the agony of being filled with anger and not being able to give vent to it. When he turned into the bedroom and looked up at that huge picture, his mind finally calmed down.
