When he gets his hands on an adjective, he declines it, and keeps on declining it until the common sense is all declined out of it.

Mark Twain about my language

"I don't like the people in my class so much", Nahlee confides over rice and freshwater fish. "They all want to show off how rich they are."

One lady in the first school brought her very handsome Euro husband to class and demonstrated how she could command him around – disgusting for Nahlee. One day the teacher had complimented Nahlee's "beautiful skirt". Next day her Thai seat neighbor, who wore jeans all the time, came back with a very beautiful, but more sexy skirt.

Isa, her Indonesian school friend in the first class, is just a small talk partner. One day after school they go shopping for full two hours. But they don't stay in touch after Nahlee changes school.

— FOREIGNERS' AFFAIRS —

Of course I had hoped she would find nice friends at school. This was one reason why I tried hard to get her into a class around my area. Ten times I told her to bring home nice people she meets – and that I would come to meetings she gets invited to. I never worry she makes me meet undesirable people: Her acadamic education is nothing to write home about, but the "education of her heart" is beyond any doubt.

All classes we saw looked about the same: They had around 70 or 75 percent ladies, which fits in with the official statistics. Quite a few of these ladies are lookers – Russians, Chinese, Ukrainians, Thais and other SE Asians. Few blacks and latinos attend these classes.

Nahlee talked more about her school mates in the new class. And rarely favorably.

"Oh, today new lady come to class. Uuuuh, ugly ugly, she has too much color in face."

"What's the problem", I ask, "is she noisy, smelly or disturbing?"

"No, she only want to be so sexy, but she looks like a… hmm… a bar girl?"

Three days later:

"You remember the lady with color in face? She never came back! Lucky, lucky, lucky!"

Currently, Nahlee is seated next to a lady with "very bad smell, oh my dear!!!" And worse: "Always she come too close, she want to copy my homework! Oh, baaaad smell!!" Nahlee says everybody may copy her homework, but the smell is unbearable. She now demonstratively closes her book for the smelly lady and tries to put the extra-centimeter between her and the other one.

The lady on the other side of Nahlee also wants to copy from her, and at least she doesn't stink. This one also offers her book to Nahlee whenever she has homework ready to copy for Nahlee. Nahlee refuses this offer, she says.

— ASIAN AFFAIRS —

The waiting room of her new, slow school is especially interesting for globalized people watching. There you meet people who do not fit into the usual foreigners' scheme. For example I watch an Iraqi bodybuilder chatting up a Russian superdoll in three different languages; they leave the school together. Then there is a sexy blond Euro lady who registers a sexy black Caribbean hiphop DJ for a beginners' class; both don't take off their sunglasses.

And you know what: In all of that polyglot chaos, SE Asians stick together. On our very first class visit, in the district school (see part 1), just when we entered the room, two Thai ladies waved at us and motioned us to sit down near them. In her first school Nahlee mostly stuck together with SE-Asians from Thailand, Indonesia, Vietnam plus a Chinese lady. In her second school, she even met Cambodians, Laotians and Burmese. Where her classmates with non-bronze skin come from, she has no idea. She prefers to talk to Caucasians and SE Asians only.

According to Nahlee, all the bronze-skinned people in her second school awkwardly communicate in MY language, because some of them don't speak English. They discuss where to buy jeans at less outrageous prices and whether it's "three o'clock" or "three o'clock hour".

Even if we only sit in the crammed corridor that serves as a waiting room for her second school: If there's another SE Asian face, at least we exchange warm and encouraging smiles. It's like "Oh, we SE Asians in this bizarre cold smelly country, we must fight and stick together". It always feels like that.

These smiles go to her, but also to me. I am fully included in that SE Asian solidarity smiles. One time I see a Thai face on the street. I flash her a solidarity smile, but she quickly looks away. No warm smile back. And why – because at that moment I forgot I am not with Nahlee. I am a single white male to her, and by our local standards, my solidarity smile was a criminal assault.

Delightful SE Asian Wife In Europe – Language And Language School

1

— LAW AND ORDER —

— SHOPPING FOR SCHOOLING —

2

— STARTING THE FIRST SCHOOL —

— AROUND THE FIRST SCHOOL —

— HER VERY FIRST TIME —

3

— PIDGIN, TALK TO ME —

— LIFELONG LEARNING —

— HAVE PROBLEM —

4

— OFFICE TALK —

— TEACHER TALK —

— PDF OCR DIC —

5

— CHECKING THE SECOND SCHOOL —

6

— LEAVING THE FIRST SCHOOL —

— STARTING THE SECOND SCHOOL —

7

— FOREIGNERS' AFFAIRS —

— ASIAN AFFAIRS —

Stickman's thoughts:

I'm waiting for the series when she goes to get her drivers licence. Now that could really be a hoot!