… and then one parent complained, and the admin micromanaged the teacher for the rest of the year.

I remember, in university, at the start of a Latin American History class the lecturer walks in with boxes and straight up asks, “SO WHO WANTS TO DO COCAINE?!?”

Then proceeds to take out coca leaf tea bags, offers everyone a cup, and explains how she was intentionally wrong in her statement to highlight a big issue. She explained the Native use of coca leaf, and how they have suffered from people using their sacred herb in concentrated and illicit ways.

She also gave me a box to take home, because I said it helped with my stomach cramps (medical issue), and it really did. No addiction felt either.

With some teachers you can really tell how passionate they are.

My senior class in high school, the French and History teachers got together to plan a senior trip to Canada post-graduation, with stops in Montreal and Quebec. They let us have beers (on our own dime) if we wanted since the drinking age up there was 18, and one of my history teachers even offered a few of us Cuban cigars the last night of the trip since there was no embargo in Canada but we couldn’t cross back into the US with them. Was a pretty good time.

We were warned the Quebecois could be kinda douchey to non-native speakers, but I found the whole trip was pretty chill, and as long as you were at least trying to speak French to them, they were more than accommodating for directions and help. Was a really memorable trip, 20+ years later still a very fond memory. Good teachers are great.