Today I got reminded of Cameron. At almost every step I took.
For those of you who are not former high school mates of mine, Cameron was our native speaker. He was Scottish in the most Scottish sense of the word (i.e. pale faced, red haired and blue eyed, skinny and with rather a strong accent). And for the year that he spent in Romania, he was the sensation in our home town. He would walk down the street and people would literally turn heads after him. He would go in shopping malls and the shopping assistants would all be extra nice to him while looking funny at him. You would think that the excitement would wear off after a while, but somehow his presence was always deemed special and interesting.
And then, there was us. The groupies that were finding him super interesting because he was Scottish and he had the cool accent and he was doing this cool thing of coming and teaching us for a year. So we would basically try to be around him as much as possible - take him for a drink, go with him to the movies, go with him in the park or wherever...just trying to hang out with him as much as we could, in our broken (but eager to be practiced) English.
I never really wondered what Cameron felt or thought about us or about his position in our town, until today when I realised that I am the Cameron of my community!
Today, I went with some of the kids in my teenager class (ages 14 - 16) to see Inside Out. The movie was very enjoyable but that is not what I want to dwell on. The point is my kids were like we were towards Cameron - shy but wanting to hang out, not understanding everything that I said but eager to please, trying to show me stuff but not knowing how to explain themselves. When I told them that they can ask me any question, no matter what, the first thing they asked was: "When are you getting married?" . I found this terribly amusing (and also thought they should discuss with my mother) cause they did not ask if I was married or if I had a boyfriend or anything else...just WHEN exactly was I planning to do that :))
All in all, it was a very enjoyable morning. But I keep thinking...how did Cameron get us to open up? I'm pretty sure he managed and I would love to know how...some of the kids here are sooooooo shy that they barely open their mouths. Advice needed people!!!
Update on this post: My very muslim teens just asked me to explain to them what FUCK means and why Americans use it so much :)) I believe this at least means that they trust me enough to ask that :) Yeyyy! Happy Ana!