I’m attending a summer camp for high school students hosted at a university. Since few students stay on campus over the summer, we’re given rooms in an empty dorm. The bathrooms are shared, and each one has toilet and shower stalls in it. One day, I’m taking a shower. No one else is in the bathroom until my friend comes in.

Friend:
“[My Name]? Is that you?”

Me:
“Yeah. I’m almost done.”

Friend:
“Oh, my God, you’re in so much trouble!”

Me:
“What? Why?”

Friend:
“For skipping the fire drill!”

Me:
“What fire drill?”

Friend:
“Uh, the one that just happened? You know, flashy lights, loud alarm, all that? [Camp Director] is furious you didn’t show up.”

Me:
“I didn’t hear anything!”

Friend:
“Sure…”

After I dry off and dress, my friend brings me to the camp director, who is, in fact, furious. She thinks I pretended not to hear the fire alarm so I wouldn’t have to go outside in a towel, but I insist that I really couldn’t hear it. Eventually, I convince her to see for herself. Someone turns the fire alarm back on, and I go back to the bathroom with her and two counselors.

Camp Director:
“If you’re lying, I will be calling your parents immediately to discuss whether you can continue attending camp.”

Me:
“I couldn’t hear it, I swear!”

Camp Director:
“We’ll see about that.”

We reach the bathroom, go inside, and close the door. The sound of the alarm all but disappears.

Counselor #1:
“Well, you can still hear it a little…”

[Counselor #2] walks into a shower stall and turns on the water. The alarm becomes completely inaudible, and the camp director’s eyes bug out in anger that is, thankfully, not directed toward me.

Camp Director:
“Excuse me. It seems I need to go yell at someone.”

From what I heard, she did go yell at some administrator from the university over putting her students’ lives — and their own — in danger. The bathroom doors in the dorm were immediately propped open with strict instructions not to close them until the situation was addressed. The next day, the university “addressed the situation” by removing the doors entirely.

This happens during my first year of studying English at university. One of the first courses I take is Introduction to Linguistics, which consists of one lecture and one seminar per week. The three-hour-long seminar is on Friday afternoon, in one of the stuffiest, most cramped classrooms on campus, neither of which are beneficial to students’ concentration. So, maybe we can be forgiven for being more dense than usual one afternoon, as the teacher is explaining allophones and phonemes. She’s wrapping up an explanation.

Teacher:
“So /c/ and /k/ are allophones of the same phoneme that are in complementary distribution.”

The struggle to comprehend must be clear on our faces, because after one look he decides to simplify it.

Teacher:
“…which means that /c/ and /k/ are different versions of the same sound that never occur in the same place.”

We’re starting to get it, but not quite. The teacher thinks for a moment and then comes up with the most brilliant analogy ever.

Teacher:
“Think of /c/ and /k/ as Clark Kent and Superman; they’re different versions of the same person that are never seen in the same place.”

Class:
“Ooooh!”

Everybody laughs, but we finally get it. From that point forward, the seminar has a new theme.

Teacher:
“So, these phonemes are in parallel distribution, which means they’re different sounds that can occur in the same place. Basically, they’re Superman and Batman — different people who can be seen in the same place.”

There’s more laughter.

Teacher:
“Phonemes can also be in complementary distributions, so different sounds that do not occur in the same place. Like, say, Batman and Spiderman.”

Quick-Witted Classmate:
“That could still happen, if DC and Marvel decide on a crossover.”

Me:
“That already happened, in the eighties, I think.”

Teacher:
“Okay, something more radical, then. How about Batman and Care Bears?”

Quick-Witted Classmate:
“That could still be a crossover.”

Classmate #2:
“Not sure I’d read that, though.”

Classmate #3:
“You kidding? That’d be hilarious!”

Teacher:
“Okay, this analogy is going off the rails, so I need something new: an apple and a book. Satisfied with that? You don’t read an apple, and you don’t eat a book.”

Sassy Classmate:
“Well…”

Teacher:
“No, I don’t wanna hear it. Does everybody at least get it now?”

Class:
“Yes!”

I don’t think I’ll ever forget the difference between complementary and parallel distribution.

My high school Spanish teacher has handed out a worksheet that features a drawing of a beach scene.

Spanish Teacher:
“Now, if you look closely, you’ll notice something very interesting about this worksheet.”

The whole class looks. I’m the first one to spot it.

Me:
“Is that guy naked?!”

Sure enough, there’s a streaker running across the beach. While his private area has been whited out, he is clearly not wearing a thing.

Spanish Teacher: 
“I have yet to be fired.”

When I’m in ninth grade, my school is demolishing an old science building and building a better one in its place. Part of the school is blocked off and it’s very loud. It’s annoying but okay most of the time, except in my Japanese class. The classroom is right next to where the construction is taking place and it’s very frustrating during our lessons. The floor is vibrating from whatever they are doing ten metres away. The class is discussing it.

Sensei:
*Sarcastically* “It’s okay, though; the school said they would buy me another whiteboard so that the noise wouldn’t be so bad.”

Us: 
*Confused* “What? How would that help?”

Sensei:
“They said they would get me a new whiteboard for the opposite side of the room so that we could face the other way. Then, the noise wouldn’t be so bad because we would be facing the other way.”

Obviously, we all found this logic hilariously stupid. We decided to try it, facing the other way. Surprise, surprise, we could still hear the sound of construction just as loud when we turned around. I know they had good intentions, but seriously, you would think they would understand how sound works.

(There’s an elderly teacher at my high school who is retiring at the end of the year. From his attitude about the situation, it’s clear that he’s retiring not because he wants to, but rather because the school is pressuring him to. And they have good reason for that. He’s become increasingly forgetful over the years, to the point that he’ll forget where his classroom is and what material he’s supposed to be teaching. He often loses students’ assignments and insists that they never turned them in instead of admitting that he can’t find them. We’ve learned to document everything we turn in for his classes. One day, I’m in his class taking notes when my pen runs out of ink. I turn around to quietly ask the person behind me if I can borrow one.)

Teacher: “[Not My Name], I told you I’d give you a detention if you disrupted class one more time!”

(I look around to see if he’s talking to someone else, since that’s not my name and I’ve never disrupted class before. He does seem to be addressing me, though.)

Me: “But–”

Teacher: “That was your final warning! You’re getting a detention.”

(He goes to his desk to fill out the detention slip. In my school, a teacher giving a detention fills out two slips, one for the student and one for the office. When he hands me the slip, I notice that the wrong name is on it — the same one he called me before. The girl whose name is on the slip is not in this class and looks nothing like me.)

Me: “Um… but I’m not–”

Teacher: “One more word and it’ll be a week of detentions!”

(I stop talking and end up not taking any notes for the rest of class. After class gets out, I go to the office.)

Secretary: “Can I help you?”

Me: “I got this detention slip, but it’s not my name on it. And I’m not really sure what it’s for. All I did was ask to borrow a pen.”

Secretary: “Let me guess: Mr. [Teacher]?”

Me: “Yeah. How did you know?”

Secretary: “We have a special file for his detentions.”

(She holds out her hand for the detention slip and I give it to her. She then puts it directly into the recycling bin.)

Secretary: “Don’t worry about the detention. He never remembers to turn in the office copy anyway.”

(I found out later that the other girl was in that teacher’s class in the previous period and sat in the same seat as me. The teacher never mistook me for her again, but it certainly wasn’t the end of his memory issues.)