Attendance

he teacher proceeded to belittle everyone from German Eva, who hated laziness, to Japanese Yukari, who lovedpaintbrushes and soap. Italian, Thai, Dutch, Korean, Chinese--we all left class foolishly believing that the worstwas over. We didn't know it then, but the coming months would teach us what it is like to spend time in thepresence of a wild animal. We soon learned to dodge chalk and to cover our heads and stomachs whenever sheapproached us with a question. She hadn't yet punched anyone, but it seemed wise to prepare ourselves againstthe inevitable.

When called upon, I delivered an effortless list of things I detest: blood sausage, intestinal pâté, brain pudding.I'd learned these words the hard way. Having given it some thought, I then declared my love for IBM typewriters,the French word for "bruise," and my electric oor waxer. It was a short list, but still I managed to mispronounceIBM and afford the wrong gender to both the oor waxer and the typewriter. Her reaction led me to believe thatthese mistakes were capital crimes in the country of France.