Aaaargh, today has been totally awesome and yet totally infuriating at the same time.
I work at a school (secondary... kids aged 11-18). Yesterday, I was asked if I would fill in for today's theatre trip (the Drama teacher was desperate and needed another member of staff.
Not desperate in a rude way - just being the junior staff member, I'm more expendable when people need me.). I was thrilled - it's a fabulous play, and I LOVE the theatre.
So, I turn up today, find it's a group of students aged 14-17. That's fine, although I wonder if some of them will really "get" the play.
O.M.G!
I repeated the drama teacher's warnings/instructions to them about a million times, and most of them STILL didn't get it. Seriously - once the curtain's up, you do not talk, giggle with your friends, kick the back of someone else's seat, put your feet UP on the seat in front, eat/drink, fidget... AAAAARGH!
It's rude to the actors on stage, and anyone who is actually attempting to enjoy the play.
Nope, they just thought it was funny when I glared at them, or when someone else's (thankfully not one of ours) phone went off during the performance, etc etc.
To be fair, a number of students sat quietly and behaved well throughout. Some drama students, mainly the ones from the upper years, silently took copious notes (they're being examined on the play), and tried to keep the worst behaved ones in check.
The ones that were good, were REALLY good.
But it just infuriated me SO much today.
A group of them somehow "missed" the tannoy call for the second half, and so were late. (Fortunately there were a lot of spare seats around us, so I made them sit in those, so as not to disrupt the students sitting in my row.) Feel free to tell me if I'm just too much of a theatre-bug, chicks, but HOW do you miss the call for the second half when it's relayed by tannoy throughout the entire building (including the ladies'/gents')?
Inconsiderate/badly behaved people at the theatre is one of my pet hates. (Probably because I love going so much, I find it basically sacreligious.)
I mean, at the CINEMA is bad enough. But the THEATRE? It's rude to the actors on stage, it's rude to the people they're disturbing... AAARGH. No, the students didn't have to pay for the tickets. Yes, the school paid for us all to travel to the theatre. But just because it's free, does NOT give them the right to behave so badly. Honestly, I was really embarrassed to be associated with (some of) them.
Today has made me so,
so grateful that my mother taught us at an early age, how to act at a theatre, and that it was a real, major treat. We started out going to pantomimes, with lots of audience participation. But when I was 10, my primary school took us to the OPERA, and me and my classmates all behaved (the teacher later told us how proud she was).
Aargh. To be honest, this isn't just about schoolkids. There are a lot of people, of all ages, who just don't seem to know how to behave appropriately in situations.
I've sat on a 12-hour coach journey behind a couple in their mid-50s, who spent the ENTIRE journey complaining about every single thing they could come up with. Including stopping at traffic lights.
I've known girls who think short, barely-cover-your-bum skirts are appropriate for a Catholic church.
I
used to be friends with people whose iPhones/smart phones are pretty much surgically attached to their hands, to the point where I went out for a meal with them, and wished I hadn't bothered travelling 50 miles just to see them, because the most conversation they gave was pretty much, "ooh, XYZ just posted a meme on Facebook!" (Not that I'm opposed to social networking sites. They just shouldn't replace human contact, especially when said human is sat at the table with you!)
What is WRONG with people???
