Horn Talk

I write this from Lagos, Nigeria, where the traffic appears utterly insane, relegating rush hour in NYC or LA to the category of “civilized”. There really are no lanes, the number of cars that can fit alongside one another is defined solely by the trenches and drop-offs paralleling the road. Motorcycles zip in and among cars and taxis, and everybody seems to be driving without any acknowledgment that other cars, lots of other cars actually!, share the road with them.

But as you chew on the unavoidable exhaust and pay closer attention, you come to appreciate a semblance of organization that is executed by horns. People don’t lay on them as they do in North America. They’re not horns of anger or rage. Different numbers and durations of horn blasts seem to indicate different things and as cars move in and among each other in tight proximity (so close that anyone who can, folds in their side view mirrors) and without benefit of defined lanes, it seems to work. The horns actually tame the wild beast that is the traffic. A colleague on this trip, Harry Lynch, the headmaster at Newman School in Boston, has named this “Horn Talk”.

When you enter a different land (and I mean that literally or metaphorically when maybe a single-sex day school visits a co-ed feeder school), it helps to know the language. Actually, it serves you well to know the language. Visiting Nigeria, a former British colony, I had to be conversant about GCSE’s and A- and O-level examinations. If you visit a Montessori school it would be good to articulate the five categories of learning. And if you want to recruit from a Sacred Heart school, you’ll go a lot farther knowing about the “goals and criteria” that manifest their values and education. Honor and respect them by taking the time to speak their language first before you expect them to speak yours.

It’s easy to think that if “they want to come to my school, they need to speak my language” but if you’re in admissions, it’s more important you speak theirs first. If you’re successful, the result will be that they then want to speak yours. HONK!