Jessica

I gave an English lesson to a young French girl named Jessica. We talked about verb tenses. The “–ing” thing is very hard to explain, but I think she got it. She also didn’t know that Texas is a state and Brazil a different country. You can imagine. She said, “Brazil is in America.”
Me: yes, but it’s not in the United States
She looked confused. I tried to draw her a picture, but my geography of South America is not very good. Jean Pierre helped. I don’t think she knew that there was a North, Central and South America which seemed crazy to me. But if you think about it, young Americans don’t always know the geography of Europe.
Her foster mother was also my French family’s nanny. That’s how we know her. She’s very timid but at the same time obviously wants very badly to succeed. She just got a job working on costumes for Disney – a big opportunity, but she wants to travel, see the world. She hopes after some time she can work in their other offices. I meet a lot of very worldly people from other countries (I am reminded of Shanti saying when we were at Alogny “I sometimes forget that I am a very worldly person, and that other people aren’t like that.”). I do not often meet people like Jessica. She’s refreshing.