Isabel slept for 8 hours. She woke up at exactly 12:00 noon. She was relieved to wake up the next day from her worst nightmare with her head still intact on her shoulders. She turned the hands of the clock again at exactly 12:00 and instantly she went back to her youthful glow.
Isabel took a bath as if it was the first and the last day of her life. She was glad that she was given another chance to make her dreams come true. She didn’t want to miss this once in a lifetime opportunity.
She chose her best formal dress and went to work.
It was Isabel’s first day of work at Cebu International Language School as an English Second Language Teacher. She couldn’t hide her excitement.
Isabel was awarded as the class valedictorian out of the 10 trainees in her class at the end of their two weeks training. She aced all the exams.
She couldn’t wait to see her students. She wondered if her students were Korean, Japanese, Russian, Chinese, Taiwanese, Iranian, French, or Thai.
She waited for her first student to come inside her cubicle. She burned the midnight oil just to prepare her lesson plan. She wanted her class to run smoothly. She didn’t want to be caught off-guard by her students unprepared. She sat on the chair confident that she would make an impression to her student and this was exactly the best profession that was suited for her.
Her first student was a Japanese guy who looked like a sumo wrestler because of his big size. He had lots of tattoo all over his body. He looked like an ex-convict.
“Good morning, madam. My name is Timon. I came from Japan.”
His voice echoed in the whole cubicle like a megaphone.
“Good morning, Timon. My name is Isabel. Nice to meet you.”
“Nice to meet you too, madam.”
They shook hands. Isabel stiffened from his iron grip.
“You may take your seat.”
“Thank you.”
“How are you doing today, Timon?”
“I’m fine.”
Isabel wanted Timon to speak more so that she could gauge him how comfortable he was in speaking English.
“Why do you want to study English?”
Timon paused for less than a minute to gather his thoughts. Isabel patiently waited for his answer.
“I wanted to study English to change my life.”
Isabel listened intently. She was thinking that maybe her hunch about him was correct that he was really an ex-convict.
“I did something that destroyed my life.”
Timon paused and checked on his electronic dictionary for the term that would describe what happened to him.
“My friends influenced me to shoplift in the mall as a sort of initiation to gain their friendship.”
Timon paused again to check the word in his electronic dictionary.
“As a teenager, I longed to be accepted in a group, so I stole a lighter. I thought that I will not be caught because it was so small. When I was about to get out from the mall, I was arrested by the guards. And that was the turning point of my life.”
Timon paused to check on his electronic dictionary again.
“I was convicted for shamefully stealing a lighter. The friends I thought who would always be there for me, did not even care to visit me. Worst, my parents disowned me. They disinherited me despite the fact that I am their one and only child. Nobody understood my situation. Why would a rich kid steal a cheap lighter when his parents can afford to buy a million lighter, even enough to burn a building? Nobody cared for me. I became an outcast. For six months inside my dungeon, I contemplated my situation. I needed to do something good to redeem myself in the society and to win my parents back. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not after my inheritance. I just want my parents to trust me and to prove to them that I’m not a liability but a valuable asset.”
“What happened after your sentence?”
“I did not waste my time. I started a noodle business. My business wasn’t that big. I operated my business as a rolling noodle restaurant. Every day, rain or shine, I pushed my kiosk from different places in Japan where there’s a lot of people. My business did well. People loved my noodles. I was inspired to expand my business one day as the biggest noodle restaurant in Japan with many outlets. My dream was spoiled before it was given a chance to flourish. Someone accused me of food poisoning. I was convicted again. I was sentenced six years in prison.
Wow! I don’t understand why life had been so cruel to me. As usual, nobody cared to visit me nor ask me how I was doing. Years of hardship inside the cold prison made me bitter. From a gentle giant, I became a big bully. I became an honored king inside my small kingdom. I used my size as an advantage to scare my other inmates. My words became law. I never felt so fulfilled in my life before. I was accepted and respected. I didn’t feel inferior anymore. I was their dictator for six years until my sentence was over. I wasn’t happy to be free again because I knew that there was no hope for me in the outside world. I wanted to go back to jail.
While waiting for the train, I saw an old man sitting on a bench obviously waiting for a train too. He put his black hand bag at his side while reading a newspaper.
I didn’t have any intention of crushing the old man nor stealing his bag. I just wanted to get the attention of the authority.
Before my hand landed on his black bag, he held my arm with one hand and twisted it. Such spectacle was a metaphor of the epic battle between David and Goliath.
I didn’t know how he did it. The next thing I knew was that my head was already rested on his lap, crying like a baby.”
“Aren’t you going to report me to the police?” I asked anxiously.
“Why would I?” He replied kindly.
“Because I attempted to steal your bag and crush your bones.”
“I don’t think you’re a bad person.”
“Yes, I am. I’m an ex-convict. I just get out from jail today.”
“It doesn’t mean just because you’re an ex-convict, you are already a bad person. You are a good person. I can see it in your eyes the way you attack me earlier. You were trying to figure out the best way to grab my bag without hurting me. At first, I don’t know what you’re up to. I can sense that you need something from me, not my bag.”
“How did you know that that is my intention to you?”
“Remember this from this day on. You are an asset in this world, not a liability. After all the Creator will not put you into this world without a purpose. Everything has its own purpose of creation.”
“That’s the point. I don’t have a purpose in life.”
“Yes, you have.”
“What’s my purpose, then?”
“That’s for you to find out. Just tell yourself every day that you are an asset in this world and not a liability; you will discover your purpose.”
The train arrived. The old man boarded inside.
He didn’t look back to ask my name. I also forgot to ask his name. He looked like an apparition of Kublai Khan because of the gem of wisdom he bestowed on me.
I stayed in the train station for several hours pondering what he had just told me. I was figuring out how I can be an asset on the society when I didn’t know where to start. I even didn’t know where I would go next. I couldn’t go back to the noodle business even though my noodles was the best in Japan.
I looked at my unfortunate self in the glass window. Then, I realized that I could be a sumo wrestler. After all what’s the point of getting an enormous body. Maybe sumo wrestling was my calling and not to be the best noodles chef in Japan.
I became the greatest sumo wrestler of all time in Japan for 10 years. I won the Emperor’s Cup and sparked wild celebrations inside the arena after I threw each of my opponents to the ground with 35 wins and 1 loss.
One night, I had my quite time figuring out where I would be several years from now after my famed glory in sumo wrestling. I was thinking to pursue my long-time passion in cooking noodles.
I invested 50% of my savings for my very first Noodle Restaurant. My business became an instant big hit in Japan on the first month since I started the operations.
“You have a very inspiring story and your English is already above average. It seems like you don’t need to study English anymore. I can’t figure out why you still wanted to study English.”
“I wanted to study English to change my life. I want to prove something. Being good in speaking English is not enough. I need a proof to show to my friends and family in Japan that I have indeed studied English in the Philippines.”
“I’m sure you’re family and friends will be very proud of you.”