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(original in Spanish, gracias, whitock).
"At the girls schools being corporally punished for the slightest fault made in class was usual.
For instance, for failing to do your homework, for being late, for standing up, for talking with your classmates and so on.
The teacher called you at her desk, and after asking you to extend the arms in front of you, palms up, she gave you several blows on your hands with a wooden ruler. Trying to move the hands was bad, because you could earn a slap on the face, and stronger blows after.
Next came what was supposed to be the actual punishment: being the rest of the afternoon kneeling with your arms stretched horizontally at your sides.
For acting as a deterrent for the rest of the girls, you had to kneel under the blackboard.
You could kneel looking to the blackboard or at the class while on the ordeal. In the first case it was boring, the second had an additional humiliation, because your classmates could enjoy your grimaces of pain during the punishment.
When kneeling with your arms outstretched, you could feel the pain in a few minutes. First it was near the shoulders, and the arms fell slightly. But after about 20 minutes, the pain was insufferable.
-Those arms! I want them stretched!
The teacher's yell made you raise with a supreme effort your arms and was good for several minutes.
The knees didn’t hurt until a little after, but when it began it was hard. If punished beside our desks, we could cheat putting a book under our knees, which would lessen the pain (with the risk of being discovered by the teacher) but in front of everybody and with the uniform’s skirt ending over the knees, it was impossible to cheat.
Then you tried rising the knees, one after the other, but those movements only made the pain sharper…
But even when the knees hurt, the pain in the arms was by far the worst… the upper arms, near the shoulders began burning. Raising your arms was more and more difficult.
It was unbearable, and it was usual to be like that for an hour and a half. Our classmates, that had been punished with books on the hands, told us that it was a terrible punishment, but I always thought that at least they could bend the elbows, while here they didn’t allow it.
The torture ended when the teacher “forgave” you and you could return to your desk, but the pain in the arms lasted several hours.
And then it remained the work of washing your knees, for avoiding your parents noticing that you had been punished at school and maybe getting another punishment at home.
Whitock"
(original in Spanish, gracias, Lolita)
"For four years, from 12 to 16, I was in a nuns boarding school where bad grades and irresponsibility where not tolerated, that’s why punishments where frequent, and I was personally a victim of them.
Children were not punished at school in my country, but they were in my boarding school, and I’m sure that it’s still so.
You were scolded for any misbehavior or low grades, but if it was repeated or serious, you were registered in the class book, and that meant that you had to stay in after finishing the hour, and there the psychological punishment began
When the bell rang, everybody left the classroom, and me, and maybe other classmates had to stay there, looking at the wall until they called our name. On those moments you could hear your classmates beaten, it was terrible.
When my turn came, I had to go to the teacher’s desk (all of them were nuns), where I had to put my hands at the table’s border with the body bent at 90º. Then I was beaten on the buttocks with one of those rectangular paddles with holes, while counting aloud. The blows were usually five, or some more if it was actually serious.
The first blows didn’t hurt too much, but at the fourth the tears flowed by themselves. Of course, nobody left the room until everyone was beaten, and, also of course, always looking at the wall.
The worst was that the day was not over, and I had more hours were obviously I had to sit, and then was where I felt the pain.
I don’t know if on those years I learnt some lesson, but I learnt to obey for avoiding suffering the punishments so often.
Lolita"
Published: 12/15/03
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