Business teacher Augustine Montemayor always had his bags ready just in case. Every three years, that day came like clockwork without fail. He would sit on the edge of his bed in pure silence while waiting for his dad to make the call.
Montemayor had a military dad, and everywhere his dad went, he followed, with his mom and sister. For Montemayor, it was always every 3 years he would either wake up in the morning or at night to a room full of boxes waiting for his mom or dad to signal him to get into the car where he sat there for hours or days to reach a new destination.
Learning new languages and making new friends were all memorable times for him. The only downside for him was leaving his friends and starting over.
“I always got to meet new people and make new friends, but would have to leave my friends, so I never really developed deep friendships because they would come and go,” Montemayor said.
After high school Augustine started at UTSA majoring in business then later upgrading to Texas A&M University at Kingsville and getting his degree in accounting business.
Before graduating from university, Mr. Montemayor’s Japanese friends, convinced him to go to Japan to do a home stay since at that moment Japan needed English teachers, and they were paying enough for him to move, so he agreed upon the offer.
Not knowing that this specific trip would change the course of his life.
“Right away I was making the money and was able to send money back to United States like 20 years ago and I paid off all my student loans and then I started to purchase some investments and so, that really helped my life.” Mr. Montemayor says.
What became a short journey to Japan to make money, had evolved into a 20 –year life changing visit. During these 20 years, Mr. Montemayor had learned to adapt to the Japanese lifestyle, in which he had to adapt to the whole concept of manners and what was the “norms”.
One thing for sure was that Mr. Montemayor was never bored. He always had fun going to festivals and enjoying traditions that were unknown to him. Even though Montemayor was known in the neighborhood for always volunteering when it came to traditional festivals.
As he matured, he took a liking to the study of gardening, martial arts and really enjoyed reading books.
“I started reading lots of books and once I started reading books I could not stop. I was reading books like crazy,” he said.
When he hit his late 30’s, he got married in Japan and began a family. However, as Mr. Montemayor grew, his parents did also, so him and his family had to migrate to San Antonio Texas where his parents had stayed ever since.
“Living in Japan really gave me a new perspective of life, because I know from Japanese culture, that the children will take care of their parents. My parents are older so I felt like it was my responsibility as their oldest son to come back to the United States and be able to look after my parents,” Montemayor said.
After a while he landed a job in Edgewood at ET Wrenn Middle School where he was teaching 7th grade math. During teaching, he was in The Teacher Alternative certification program. And after a while, he was transferred to John F Kennedy, where he is now known as Mr. Montemayor, the business teacher. He described the shift from middle school to high school, “hyper to mature.”
“I’m hoping there’s lots of good things to get done and that Kennedy gets some recognition,” Mr. Montemayor says.
