My English Teacher retired

It’s year-3 and we just had a new English teacher.

He’s sort of the more “close-minded” teacher, have a rather strict set of rules and are not always received by everyone.
But in terms of actually teaching I think he does a pretty good job, often providing his own materials and pass on his experiences to ensure we can pass the subject.
As long as you do actually listen to what’s he saying then there’s usually no problem.

He’s also one of the more senior teachers and have a strong sense of responsibility, so he generally have more says on stuff and you can pretty much take his word for it.

So around a month ago he took a short break for maybe like 2 weeks, and leaves the task to the substitude teachers.
But damn that substitude teacher rarely actually teaches stuff, having strict rules, only keep saying stuff on our book word by word then ask us what is the answer like what even is the point??? And that just left me pretty pissed off.

Anyways the English teacher did return later and I was more relieved, but around 2 weeks ago he said he’s “taking a long break” and will once again leave the rest of the task another substitude teacher for the time being.

Now I should’ve been alerted at this point as:

• He just had a break not long ago
• He didn’t specify the time when he returns, which is very unusual as he usually has a strong sense of responsibility

But he just says it in a “casual” way, and if anything I am clearly more worried of what will be the next substitude teacher than him taking a break.

As expected another substitude teacher came (Not a bad one btw) shortly after, but almost the first thing she said is “Yea so you know your English teacher is retired right”, and we’re just like ?????.
Well… I guess he’s not wrong about it being a “long break”, but I don’t quite understand why would he not just straight up tell us.
Maybe he just want us to keep focusing on the subject rather than him retiring? I don’t know but it just keeps bugging me over and over.

You might think I am crazy for being such emotionally attached to a teacher, but he’s really one of the few teacher that can actually teach stuff in a very good way that most student can understand properly. Either way it’s also just weird to see him just leave in mid-semster on the final year, there’s something incomplete about it.

He did however return yesterday (Presumably to pack up the rest of his stuff at school) and I get to see him (probably one last time) when changing lessons.
He did said some encouragement words to me, I can only wonder does he knew what the teacher told us…