Teacher sees clutch repair as a means of reaching her true self

Do-it-yourself is a noble ethos perhaps best applied to punk rock, reclaimed-wood picnic tables or a Sunday-long Bolognese sauce.

It is not, typically, the go-to approach for resolving any automotive issue that involves transmission removal and clutch replacement.

And yet, there was Camille “Calico” Jan spending an inclement weekend inside the loaned covered garage of a friend, YouTube videos on the ready, prepared to pop the hood of her 2008 Toyota Matrix and dive — intrepid spirit first — into her first major auto repair project.

“I thought I’d give it a shot,” Jan said.

Jan, a teacher at the Kosasa Academy in Kailua, was driving up Pali Highway when she heard the distinctive “clunk” of money about to exit her bank account. Unable to get the car in gear, Jan went to an auto shop to see what was wrong.

“They said I needed a new clutch,” Jan said, “and the whole thing was going to cost $1,200.”

Jan did some research and found that the parts needed cost just a couple of hundred dollars. The balance was all labor — labor that Jan was perfectly willing to do herself.

A scan of what was free and readily available online — how-to videos on YouTube, service manual PDFs, model-specific repair blogs — gave Jan the confidence that she could indeed handle the replacement herself, and she had friends who could help remove the transmission. It was worth a shot.

“A thousand bucks is a thousand bucks,” she said.

And yet Jan’s willingness to undertake what might intimidate others is not merely an aversion to parting with hard-earned money. It also has a bit to do with the youthful desire for self-actualization.

“I’ve always wanted to be a person who can fix stuff on her own,” she said. “And if you want to be what you value, you have to start doing it.”

Jan was born and raised in San Diego, the third of four children. Her father is an attorney, her mother a certified public accountant.

She attended Evangel University, a private Christian college in Springfield, Mo., where she majored in biology and environmental science with a minor in chemistry.

But Jan never took to college — “hated” it, by her own estimation. She disliked the cold winters, the joyless rigor. Nonetheless, she dutifully completed her degree with a resolve to do whatever was necessary to move on to the next phase of her life.

Jan always had intended to go to graduate school, but she wasn’t sure what she wanted to pursue. Medical school? Research?

“I decided I wanted to take a year to figure out what I wanted to do and figure out where my priorities are,” she said.

After a brief return to California, Jan moved to Honolulu and found work teaching and tutoring at a specialized school for students with social, developmental, psychological or other special needs that make it difficult to succeed in traditional learning environments.

Jan did not have any previous formal experience in education prior to joining Kosasa Academy in 2016, but the training she received coupled with her own strong desire to help children “see their own worth” has translated to an experience that has helped her figure out some of those priorities.

“I like helping to take kids who have been kicked aside or overlooked by the system and helping them learn to be students and a part of society,” she said. “I’ve realized that my priorities in this world are to help people to grow and to be who they are.”

In the meantime, there remains a Toyota Matrix in need of fixing. An inopportune bug bite sent Jan to the hospital with a severe infection in her arm and stalled the repair project for at least a few days. But she will be back at it as soon as she recovers. She reckons it’s part of her growth, part of being who she wants to be.

Reach Michael Tsai at mtsai@staradvertiser.com.