28 May 2009

A New Washington Capitals Fan

A VERY COOL thing happened at school today.

Thursdays are they day I have to get to teach 5eme and 6eme students (not exactly my strong suit). Over the past couple of months I have been giving weekly updates on my beloved Washington Capitals (an NHL hockey team) as they finished the regular season and made a run through the playoffs. I've even gone so far as to show them a 3-minute clip of Washington's best player, a Russian named Alexandre Ovechkin, during one of our breaks. When the Capitals lost in the 2nd round of the playoffs earlier this month, we had a moment of silence in class.

This morning when I went out to the courtyard to pick up the 5eme students at 8:00 a flash of red caught my attention. As I looked up I noticed a student wearing a bright red Washington Capitals t-shirt with a big number 8 on the back, just below the name OVECHKIN (see right).

I was stunned for a second. This is France. Nobody knows anything about hockey in France. So I just pointed at the shirt and said, 'That's a Capitals shirt. And it has Ovechkin's number on the back.'

He just looked at me with a big smile and said, 'Yes'. I needed more information. 'Where did you get it?'

In a French accent he said, 'I told my my dad I wanted an Ovechkin shirt for my birthday and he found it on the internet. I just got it last week.'

How great is that? Not only am I a great father, it turns out I'm a great teacher too.

[Note: making this story even better is that my brother brought be the exact same shirt when he visited a couple weeks ago. I'm wearing it now.]
CJS

4 comments :

Ksam said...

Hold your horses here - one of your 5èmes said "I told my my dad I wanted an Ovechkin shirt for my birthday and he found it on the internet. I just got it last week." in ENGLISH? How is that even possible??

French for a While said...

I'm at an International School. Most students have some English skills before they are accepted as students.

Ksam said...

oh THAT makes much more sense - I also taught in a lycée for a while and even the terminales wouldn't have been able to spontaneously say that!

Jeremy Scriven said...

That just made my day!!