All change, please.

When Mrs. Jana announced the name of my supply teacher, she did so with a peculiar expression on her face and arms folded across her chest. "You will be having lessons with Ms. Ivanka." Sniff. "She is young." Pregnant pause. "I think that you will find her lessons will be very different." Sniff. "Yes, very different." Sniff. "She is very young."

So I'm now having classes with the young and presumably flighty Ms. Ivanka who so far seems rather enthusiastic about trendy, fashionable, "young" things like conversation and so on. All of which hurtles me smack-bang into the granite-hard wall that is my lack of everything in this language (vocab, grammar, syntax, accent, cheese).

Anyhow, to get acquainted, we had an intense discussion about my weekend this morning.

Ms.I. "So what did you do this weekend?"
Me. "I go up hill."
Ms.I. "You went up a hill."
Me. "You went up a hill."
Ms.I. "No. Yooouuuu..." points finger at me "...went up a hill."
Me. lightbulb pops on "Ohhh… I went up hill."
Ms.I. sighs "Something like that." deep breath "What did you do there?"
Me "I eat."
Ms.I. "You ate."
Me "You ate."
Ms.I. "No…incomprehensible string of syllables...Youuuuuu…" points finger at me, with slightly more emphasis.
Me "I eat salad."

Thank heavens Ms. Ivanka's extreme youth means she has the mental energy to sustain such conversations.