School Days

St. Catherine’s drew students from among British Hondurans from the City and the Districts, British Army families, and the myriad of foreign nationalities represented in Belize for business or personal reasons. By about age eight, many British boys were sent back to England for “proper” Public School educations, often at serious financial strain for their families. Some local sons were sent to private schools in Jamaica or Barbados. By the equivalent of U.S. Seventh and Eighth grades, Alex was one of two boys in his class. This exclusivity came just as little girls began to notice little boys. The result was that the boys became crown princes with fawning courts. The two years of schooling were complete waste.

 

Then came high school and the Jesuits of St. John’s College. Pampered princes rapidly were cut down to size by the hard academic work and stern supervision of the Fathers.

Years later, listening to Alex reminisce, I learned that at St. John’s College, Alex had to take exams and do his homework in fountain pen, not ballpoint. Father Cull addressed the freshman class on their first day, saying, “You are men now and there are two things a man always carries—a wallet and a fountain pen.” The boys soon learned that the wallet was a repository for their demerit cards.

Alex said that when he turned in his first homework at George Tech, his professor exploded, “What are you trying to prove?”

Alex explained about the St. John’s rules. The professor shook his head in disbelief and said, “Boy, you had better learn to use a pencil.”

 

Regarding lawn care in Belize, I wrote relatives in 1955:

The local yard men cut grass with a machete…a perfectly enormous one…even on a regular lawn, not just on tall roadside grass! They swing the blade up against a steel rod in some way, I guess just so that it won’t continue the swing and hack off a leg!

In the late 1970’s, I watched Alex cutting grass with a machete and asked how he ever had learned to do it.

“Do you remember all those times I was late coming home from school?” Alex asked with a smile. “I was jugged.”

“Jugging” was St. Johns’ punishment for sins bookish or behavioral, and involved the wholesome, cost-effective assignment of offenders to cut the grass on the extensive school grounds with the standard Belize “lawn mower,” a well-sharpened machete.