The Classroom of Brother Felix
The Classroom of Brother Felix
The original story credit goes to Rohan Weerakkody, my lifelong pal and classmate in junior school who compiled this storyline in Sinhala
The first week of January 1968 began with a new classroom and a new teacher.
We had passed Grade Seven and said goodbye to Mr Jayamanna. From the playing field, the large two-storey school building stood before us. We entered the last classroom on the ground floor, two at a time.
It was cleaner and more orderly than the other classrooms. Thirty-six identical wooden desks stood in four rows, each numbered. At the front were the teacher’s desk and chair. Behind them was a huge blackboard built into the wall.
But what caught our attention was the painting above the windows — a diver disappearing beneath the sea. No other classroom had anything like it.
We liked the room.
Then Brother Felix arrived.
We stood.
“God bless you, teacher,” we said together.
“No. No. No.”
He raised his hand.
“I am a Christian Brother.”
There was silence.
“What are you supposed to say?”
“God bless you, Brother.”
“Correct.”
He paused.
“And always.”
That was our first lesson from Brother Felix.
It was about obedience.
⸻
He sent us onto the veranda in two lines. We were told to take our bags and rubbish with us.
Then he produced a small white-covered book.
“Who has this?”
Only a few hands went up.
“What about the rest? Did you leave it at home? Didn’t you buy one?”
He told us that everyone had to bring it the following day.
Then he asked who had been the Grade Seven monitor.
Marcus slowly raised his hand.
Brother Felix called him forward and asked him to lead the morning prayer.
The book contained prayers followed by Catholic hymns. We stood with our schoolbags hanging from our shoulders. Some boys put their bags down because they were heavy.
Brother Felix noticed.
A gesture from him and the bags were back on our shoulders.
He inspected us like a sergeant-major.
That was Brother Felix.
He noticed everything.
⸻
The classroom soon had rules.
No coming late.
If you were late, stay at home and return the next day with a letter explaining why.
The two boys responsible for the classroom had to arrive early, sweep the floor, remove the rubbish and arrange the desks in straight lines.
No carving the desks.
No holes.
No writing.
No ink stains.
No graffiti on the walls.
Come properly dressed.
Wear shoes.
No sandals.
And never arrive without your books, pens, pencils and eraser and expect someone else to lend them to you.
The desks were numbered too.
Brother Felix called our names from the old register and assigned our seats.
There would be no choosing where to sit.
No sitting beside your best friend.
The classroom belonged to Brother Felix.
⸻
The other teachers gradually became familiar faces.
Mr Jayawardena taught Science. He had lost his left hand near the wrist and usually wore a handkerchief around it. He arrived in a large black Morris Minor.
Felix Perera taught Geography.
Eric Perera, recently out of university, taught History.
Anthony Fernando taught Sinhala. We remembered him mainly for his punishments — twisting the flesh around a boy’s stomach and the occasional hard slap.
Brother Canisius, a young Tamil Jesuit, taught Art.
But Brother Felix taught us Catholic religion, Mathematics and English.
He was a small man, perhaps four feet seven inches tall, with short, greying hair and a bald, shiny head.
We noticed everything about him.
Even the way his fingers sometimes went to his nose after scratching his bald head.
One morning, during the religious parade, his hand was already near his face when he approached us.
A slap intended for his face met his own hand instead.
We saw it.
He saw us seeing it.
Nobody laughed.
⸻
Football season had begun.
Three mornings a week, the Under-14 players trained from five to eight.
One of our classmates was the team captain.
After training he ran home, washed, ate breakfast and hurried to school.
One morning he arrived late for Brother Felix’s English class.
He stood outside with his schoolbag over his shoulder.
Brother Felix continued teaching as though he wasn’t there.
Eventually:
“Why are you late?”
“Brother, it is morning football practice.”
“Letter. Where is the letter from the coach or anyone?”
There was no letter.
“Out.”
He pointed towards the cassia trees.
“Go and stand under the trees. Right, football man.”
The boy left.
We watched from the classroom.
A few minutes later Brother Cassian, the principal, called him over from the corridor.
Brother Cassian loved football. He knew the boy well.
The boy returned to class.
After that, Brother Felix never questioned his football lateness again.
But we knew he had not forgotten the incident.
⸻
The end of term was our happiest time.
The holidays meant freedom.
Brother Felix seemed to think that freedom needed a price.
On the last day he filled the blackboard with twenty-five mathematics problems.
We were also told to memorise the Magnificat from Luke’s Gospel, attend Mass and have our De La Salle cards signed by the priest.
We went home.
The mathematics was soon forgotten.
So was the Magnificat.
When school reopened, the first thing we remembered was Brother Felix.
Some boys were frantically copying the mathematics from their friends.
I managed seventeen of the twenty-five before the bell rang.
Then Brother Felix entered.
He collected the exercise books.
Those who had not completed the work were sent into the corridor.
There were about fifteen of us.
I was one of them.
He called us in one by one.
“Twenty-five questions. You have done twenty. Why?”
No answer.
“Hand.”
Five strokes.
The next boy.
The punishment matched the number of questions left undone.
When my turn came, I had eight unfinished.
Four strokes on each hand.
My palms were numb for hours.
Then Ahmad was called.
He had done none.
Twenty-five strokes.
He stood without moving.
Brother Felix continued until the cane broke.
Then, in anger, he struck at Ahmad with his hand.
He missed.
He lost his balance.
A boy jumped up to steady him, knocking over a heavy teak desk.
The desk fell on Brother Felix’s toes.
He screamed.
Brother Nicholas came running from the neighbouring classroom.
The same boys who had been receiving punishment were now helping Brother Felix to the first-aid room.
His toes remained swollen for weeks.
⸻
We were children then.
We thought Brother Felix was simply a strict teacher.
Years later, I began to see him differently.
A teacher does not enter a classroom empty-handed.
He brings his childhood, his family, his disappointments, his wounds and his fears.
Sometimes he brings them without knowing it.
Authority can turn those wounds into discipline.
And discipline, without understanding, can become cruelty.
Brother Felix was a Christian Brother.
But beneath the white robe was a man.
And in front of him were thirty-six boys, each with a life he knew very little about.
In 1968, we knew none of this.
We knew only our desk numbers.
The huge blackboard.
The diver beneath the sea.
The cane.
And Brother Felix.
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