Wednesday, November 14, 2007

The next generation?

I should have known it was a bad sign that Seva was making bombs when I arrived for his English lesson.



I was bitten and put in a headlock before we even began. After about 20 minutes of waiting for him to stop playing and get ready for English, I was getting irritated.

"Okay, I'm going home," I announced, and made my way towards the door.

"Noooo, one minute," he said.

"Nope, I've been waiting for 20 minutes already. I'm going home."

Seva body-slammed the door shut.

"Sit at your desk then."

"You first."

"No. Sit down."

"You first." (still blocking the door)

I called his mom and explained the situation, and she talked to him a bit over the phone. His eyes narrowed to slits and tears seeped out. We decided to give the lesson another try.

After the phone call, both of us sat in our places. It was a stalemate.

“Okay, we can have the lesson over here.” Seva said. He brought all the materials over to the bed and we began to make a game for review.

I wrote question cards while Seva did his part. He managed to write one half of "finish" and then got tired.

But he wrote "next level" with no problem. Video games, perhaps?

I enjoyed his next attempt. "Oh no, it's a monster!" At least he wrote in English.

What will the next lesson bring? Will Seva's room still be intact after his bomb tactics?

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