So I was in the Tower Records in Stonestown Galleria this afternoon, looking for a present. Three high school kids were at the magazine section, looking through High Times:
Kid #1: Omigod! That is the biggest joint I have ever seen!
Kid #2: Wow. That's all the cops need, to get them busted. [Pause.] They just have to see that photograph, and it's proof.
Kid #1: Yeah, but maybe they didn't inhale.
Kid #2: [pauses] You're right.
Kid #3: [pointing to a different page] Is that a boob?
[Kid #1 and 2 snicker.]
Kid #1: Hey, do you guys get National Geographic?
Kid #2: Yeah, I don't know why my grandma thinks we like that stuff.
Kid #1: I used to read it for the boobs, but that was before I realized there was better porn in the world.
And in the "what the--?" section, a student of mine in my undergraduate anthropology class hands me a writing exercise that he wrote for an English class.
It's about me. "Hope you have a sense of humor," he says, before he runs out the door.
His first sentences go:
In my English class I was given an... assignment to study a person of my choice and determine a number of inferences through keen observation. Ironically, I choose an anthropologist for an anthropology type assignment. The hunter has now become the hunted.I read on:
Benito Vergara portrays himself as a young studious professor, but with dork-like attire he has "nerd" written all over him. Vergara is old enough to be a college graduate, but his young baby-face makes him resemble a scrawny youthful boy with glasses, a book worm.I'm totally dumbfounded by this point -- one-third puzzled, one-third amused, and one-third amazed at this guy's balls. (Alas, the guy looks like he's in the bottom half of the grade curve, but I digress. A good kid, but...) But perhaps some choice phrases may round it out for you:
- "coffee-charged and sometimes eccentric enthusiastic behavior"
- "sloppy combination of his nappy hair and wrinkled clothes"
- "Although Vergara may have nice clothes, the clothes do not make him look nice."
- "animated and anxious smile"
- "corrupt behavior from this mad Filipino"
- "cruel trickery and insane lecturing speed"
- "making other people suffer is Vergara's bliss" [I should qualify this point: the student was referring to my early morning laziness suddenly dispelled by a few sips of coffee, where he writes that his anticipation of "an easy, brainless hour in class" was now gone, and he had to "suffer."]
- "peculiar taste in music" [I laughed out loud at that one]
And finally, the merciful end:
...he may very likely be a gothic vampire, who lives without sleep secretly plotting out strategies of making a student's life miserable while taking advantage of a wholesome image as a college professor. Even though Vergara may look simple and innocent, his interestingly unique personality suggests something darker and far more complex residing within him.And to end with my favorite sentence so far from this last round of grading (gleaned from another student's paper) -- a bit misinformed, but that's not why I'm quoting it:
...I would hate to live in India because I think that the caste system is immoral, wrong and simply lame.Posted by the wily filipino at May 21, 2003 08:04 PM