There are some heroes. They are real and moral heroes. In the square. You won't see them. You won't hear them either. Let me introduce you: they are the teachers of the reception classrooms. But, hey, the ones who always speak in Catalan. Hello (in Catalan).
In the reception classrooms, students who have joined the Catalan education system in the last twenty-four months arrive. It is their first and most important contact with the country, the culture, and the language. First shock. Many teachers don't want to run reception classrooms. Breathe! It's less. They don't get to show off. No. But there are teachers who do. They do it because they believe, like in every country in the world, that they are teachers of a country: Catalonia. And that boy, that girl, arrives from Honduras, Algeria, Ukraine… And they speak to them in Catalan from the very first second. And they explain to them that this is a country that has a language, a culture, a history… And they are amazed by meatballs with Sugus candies. And they learn that they can eat this local dish. And everything goes well until…
Those children, when they return to the important, higher-level classrooms, feel that many teachers who should be teaching in Catalan are teaching in Spanish. Or answering them in Spanish. When they go out into the street, everyone speaks to them in Spanish. And they nod their heads and wonder: what's the point of Catalan? And they rebel. Kleenex. First an annoying snot. Then a wound. Blood. Pain. Crime. It's already the language of a dictatorial regime. Imposition. Racism. And the reception classrooms are a prison island. And the teachers are jailers. And our heroes are alone.
Here begins the drama of the future. The reception classrooms should be the synchrotron of the Catalan education system. They are the nuclear power plant. Switch. Click. Yes or no. Language, culture, the country are at stake in hours, days, and in one person. Panting, sweating, exhausted. The victory or defeat of many children and the country rests in the hands of one person. Must everything depend on her? Let's see.
What we see is the future. In disgusting and dramatic 360 degrees. The holistic view of despair. And the Catalan illiterate either pisses on or mocks those kids who attend the Education Fair and, microphone in hand, don't know what a mountain range is, how to locate the Pyrenees, a region of their country, or the president of their country… They don't even know where they are. Or who they are. Nothing and nothingness. And a lot of people press the nuclear button and missiles are launched against the education system, teachers, blackboards… And for years and ages, those of us who come from the culture that has shaped this country have been asking ourselves: and the parents, where are they? Don't they have anything to do with all this? Because school teaches and family teaches. If one leg fails, the whole way around fails.
Without ever setting foot in the Pyrenees, you don't know Catalan either. No Pyrenees, no Catalan. Then you expect these children who arrive here to speak a language you neither speak nor reproduce. But you don't tell them about empathetic aioli, wild thyme, Gaudí who only spoke Catalan… About that country that has built and paid for everything. Catalan doesn't fail because of a system it has never had: it fails because of the people. And then those children are left alone, isolated, aliens. Imprisoned, circling through space with no possibility of returning to Earth. The teachers in the reception classrooms warn of the future.
Take note: you failed. It's you: resigning teachers, resigning parents, the country resigns. Take note, because you'll be screwed. Turned against everyone. Against you first and foremost. And you'll end up in the garbage collection classrooms. Condemned by those you yourselves have condemned.
