This happened in fencing club at our boarding school. We’re rather laid-back and relaxed, but at some point, another school challenged us to a match, which required us to send a student representative with the coach to help settle the details. So, the coach brought it up in a fencing lesson, stating that he needed someone to become the “club president” and help him with the details.

Our boarding school has a quirk where we call the Year Twelves “Juniors” and the Year Thirteens “Seniors.”

Someone proposed that there be an election, which prompted me to cast my vote for my enthusiastic junior. But that idea was shot down as the strongest fencer in the group decided that we should have a tournament with the club captainship as the prize, which was an even more popular idea.

Then, just when we were putting on our gear and preparing for the tournament, one of my fellow seniors argued that as we seniors were preparing to go to university, club captainship should fall to us as we needed it more on our personal statements than the juniors did. They could have their turn as club captain next year, when they themselves became seniors.

Somehow, they convinced the coach, mostly because other clubs in school had a similar precedent. I wasn’t very happy with the decision, as I considered it childish and the two seniors vying for the club captain position were basically people who joined the club at the same time as the juniors. In fact, they never even held a sword until they joined the club, unlike half of the juniors, who were veteran fencers in their previous schools. They just wanted the position to burnish their personal statements and make themselves more attractive to universities.

Regardless, the coach did not seem to notice that those two were blatantly after the position for selfish reasons and named the only other senior in the club president: me. 

He was backed unanimously by the juniors, leaving the two other seniors stunned. They then tried to argue against my appointment, but the coach shot them down. I was the last member of last year’s team, the oldest and seniormost student and the one with the most attendance, and although I wasn’t the best fencer, I was the only veteran fencer among the three seniors.

I didn’t really want the position, but I could not deny being greatly amused at the way my fellow seniors’ faces fell. Still, I offered the two of them the opportunity to claim club captainship in a mini-tournament between the three of us. Two easy victories later and I was crowned club captain. Somehow they never really came back to the club during my captainship.

The coach used a balloon sword he picked up from a fencing shop to “knight” me and offered it to me as my “sword of office.” After I stepped down as captain after the year, I was allowed to keep the sword as a farewell gift.

According to my juniors, it has now become a tradition for the coach to “knight” new club captains with such balloon swords and that they’re allowed to keep the blade after they retire.

(My friend at school is Black and I am white. I’ve recently befriended a new girl, who is also white. We’re all three hanging out at lunch, talking about a hair appointment.)

Me: “So, what shampoo do you use? I mean, I’ve never really thought about it, but because you’re Black–”

New Girl: *interrupting* “Oh, my God! Don’t say that! She’s African-American, aren’t you, [Friend]?”

Friend: “Uh… I’m not African or American; I’m a Caribbean-British person. And yeah, I’m Black…”

(The new girl went off in a huff and didn’t talk to us for a few days. I mean, I know appropriate language differs from country to country, but she had the same accent as us, so she’s definitely British, too!)

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I went to a Catholic high school, and at the time, all freshmen had to take Latin I. On the first day of class, the teacher went into how a lot of words in English have Latin roots.

“When the word has ‘bi-‘, it means ‘two.’ With ‘tri-‘, you have ‘three.’” He followed with, “And when you have ‘mono-‘ you have…”

A classmate piped up, “Trouble!”

That’s a Latin lesson I’ve never forgotten.

We happen to have bats hanging out in the attics of many of our older campus buildings. Many students aren’t aware of this, but if a person is quiet and patient, they can watch bats fly from behind some of the older buildings. Our library, in particular, has a problem and there are signs on doors, in the elevator, stairwell, etc., to not touch bats and inform staff if one is spotted flying around. Only the third floor is a quiet space; all other floors have community areas for groups to collaborate in and talk. 

One night, I’m up on the second floor with a bud when we notice squeaking after a while. It’s not bothersome and we figure it’s either bats or the A/C is janky. Whatever, the building is old. A group of athletic underclassmen, however, decide they want to know for sure. At first, it’s just one or two coming over and looking at a window. Even I get up and briefly look closer. I recognize the sound, figure it’s not worth my time or health to bother with, and walk away. 

My bud and I are tolerably amused as the investigations are becoming more common and with bigger numbers. They’re impressively quiet.

Eventually, some of them even begin trying to jump to reach the ceiling and dislodge a panel. They can touch it but not dislodge it. I figure that’s enough.

Me:
“Hey, man, you know those are probably bats.”

This, of course, just wins some “Oh, cool, I’ve never seen a bat before” looks and their efforts increase for a moment. 

Me:
“Do you also know bats are known for carrying rabies?”

Student:
“Oh, s***, man. Really?”

Me:
“Really.”

I know that bats are not significantly more likely to carry rabies than other mammals, but this stopped the investigations for the night. We did tell the staff.

In my eleventh-grade English class, every Monday, the teacher would have twenty words on the board that we’d be tested on on Friday. We would have to spell all twenty words, and she’d pick four words on Friday we’d have to be able to define for the test.

One week, we’d made it all the way to Friday without using the board, so the words were still printed on it. The teacher gave her usual “we’re doing the vocabulary test now” statement, when one of the girls pointed at the blackboard and asked, “Aren’t those the words?”

We all groaned and gave her some — mostly good-natured — grief about it.