Subtitles Needed

Devan-
On a daily basis I am frustrated by my floundering language skills. Not only is learning languages my lowest skill set but Japanese is like the hardest language EVER! Every Wednesday at 4:30 my teachers have a meeting that I'm expected to attend. I never understand what they are talking about but it forces me to be at my desk and study Japanese. Well today was weird. First, the meeting never happened. There was a phone call; all of the "big wigs" went into the Principal’s office for a few minutes. When they came out the Principle had a written page in his hand that he proceeded to read to the rest of us. I didn't understand, obviously, but everyone's face went from horrified to grief in seconds as he read. People started crying and one lady had to be carried out of the room because she was sobbing. Now in my past year here I have never seen any Japanese person express emotion (other than our neighbor who beats her child). I'm not saying they don't, it's just that they keep it under wraps around the foreigner.
What I did understand while he was reading was a teacher's name (who wasn't at school today), something was happening on Saturday, and that one of our vice-principles will be taking over that other teacher's class. After the principle was done and everyone was starting to get up I asked the guy next to me what had just happened. He told me, "It's difficult, Tabeta Sensei will be teaching Suzuki sensei's class." ARG, I had already gotten that much. No one around me seemed willing to explain what had just happened so I didn't ask anymore and went home. My first thought was that this teacher died. Saturday would be around the time for a funeral (2-3days). Maybe he did something and got fired but why would an entire room respond in tears to that?
I feel kind of bad speculating about this man's possible death (I really liked him, he didn't speak any English but he always tried to talk to me which is more than most of those teacher's do). I'll probably find out more tomorrow but for the time being it's really frustrating being in the dark.
If anything, being here has made me more sympathetic to immigrants in America who don't speak English. Learning a language is defiantly easier said than done.