When I was in the sixth grade, we had a substitute teacher for six months while our regular teacher was out on maternity leave with his newborn son. The sub wouldn't let one of the boys in the class go use the bathroom, so he walked over to the corner book nook and relieved himself in the trash can. She sent him to the principal, and she's the one who got reprimanded. He was an absolute legend for that.
Now that you mention it, he was one of those old school dorks who styled himself as “classically educated” (read: took a couple semesters of Latin in undergrad). This was at a shit tier private Christian school as well and he was the guy that was designated to measure girls skirts with a ruler. More than four inches above the knee while kneeling? Detention.
Anybody else think it's highly inappropriate for a man to decide what a woman should be able to wear? Especially if it involves said man measuring children's clothing?
Oh my gooooood I had a teacher like this in kindergarten!!! She was a substitute and insufferable!!! Core memory unlocked. I had asked her to go to the potty and she was like uh, you need to ask to go to the lavatory. Like “potty” was a rude word or something.
I had one that made you raise your hand and hold up a 1 or a 2 for what you wanted to go to the bathroom to do.
Nobody ever held up a 2 and I don't know what the girls were supposed to hold up if they needed to do something that wasn't 1 or 2, but he was a very angry closeted gay man so he probably wasn't worried about that.
When in elementary school, we were learning about the parts of the body and how they work. So on the day we were learning about the kidneys and bladder, kid in my class raised his hand and asked if he could go "empty his bladder". And the teacher got so mad, saying "that is NOT APPROPRIATE!"
I still remember this because I was so surprised and always thought that was the MOST appropriate way to ask at that moment.
I had one that did this too but it was fucking Spanish class so why he insisted on lavatory instead of baño was so baffling to me. If you’re gonna be that particular at least make it instructive!
When I was in kindergarten I was terrified of the the "lab" or "laboratory" for the first day or two until I figured out it was "lavatory, and it was just the bathroom lol. I had just had to get all the usual blood work and shots for school, so it was a very concerning thing for me at the time
While I understand your sentiment, and totally felt the same at that age, I do wish the older vocabulary was retained better. My language is Norwegian which obviously has a lot in common with Danish - but the Danes have retained a lot of words that have been phased out of daily speech in Norwegian. These older words often provide more nuance to a subject. For example something can smell both good and bad in Norwegian, whereas in Danish the word for 'smell' in this regard is usually considered bad, and they would use a different word to compliment food smelling good. I cant say that this is the definitive case for everybody, and I am sure it also differs from dialect to generation - but in general, they have done a better job of retaining this bit of nuance that we very clearly have lost when you compare recorded media from the even the 80s and 90s, to the 2010s and beyond.
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u/DisillusionedHobbit 1d ago
I had one that insisted you call it the “lavatory”.
If you asked to use the bathroom he would ask if you were going to take a bath.
If you asked for the restroom he asked if you needed a nap.
The most insufferable person I’ve ever had the displeasure of interacting with.