Dimensions
136 x 207 x 19mm
"Richie was a pale, anaemic-looking, spindly-limbed, seemingly malnourished little urchin who had seen very little sun in his time on this planet. Imagine a young Mr Bean or, even better, Eddie Munster. Almost every morning, as my two colleagues and I drove up to the school we would see him hanging around the bike shed and, unable to remember the Munsters' theme song, we settled for a couple of choruses of the next best thing - 'The Addams Family' (Da da da da, tse tse . . . )"
In the course of twelve months, Glenn learned an awful lot about people. As a history graduate and high school teacher, he had two pretty good reasons to have a pessimistic view of the human race. As the former, he spent years grappling with the appalling vices of man.
He long believed that references to despicable humans as "animals" were grossly unfair to animals, that generally kill out of instinct and need. Humans are, he believes, capable of the best, but also the worst possible behaviour. And as the latter, having spent more than eight years in the government education system, he had seen enough apathy, selfishness and disrespect to last him a lifetime.
This is not to say that he lost all faith. He certainly never seriously entertained taking up the life of a hermit. On the contrary, he lived a hugely social life and has always surrounded himself with friends from all walks of life. Still, when he decided to take up a one-year teaching position in England, he thought his greatest memories would be of the exotic locations he visited during the school holidays - Ireland, Spain, Portugal, Egypt, Hungary, Greece, France, Norway and New York.
Little did he know how close he would become to a new batch of friends and how many laughs he would share. The people he met form the fondest and most enduring memories of his year away. In this collection of stories, he'd like to tell you about some of them.
