Saturday, July 02, 2011

Just when you thought you knew everything....





So shoot me but being an English teacher can be such a frustrating, aggravating job, it often leaves me seriously questioning the existence of cerebral matter in my students. 

Last week though, I was pleasantly surprised to learn that one of them had actually written and published a book towards the end of last year. No, wait, as it turns out, three kids had published books last year. One was something of a how-to book for teens. Growing-up angst, career advice, etc. I didn't actually read it but I was at the book launch, and the writer, a bespectacled, seriously serious, earnest, old beyond his years type droned on about it at some length. To be honest, it sounded to me like cleverly culled and translated extracts from English books and magazines. Student #2's book was a laugh-fest kind of book, I think. Not sure since I haven't read it either. But this one I discovered last week is a real, honest to goodness, 160 paged work of fictitious literature with a proper plot, characters, dialogue, settings et al. Er, I've only read three chapters so far but it's surprisingly well-written and compact thus far.

The real reason I'm so almighty impressed is that the writer is only 20. Mapuia was born in 1990, the same year as my second nephew. And it puts me to shame, that statistic. I certainly never was that coherent or articulate at that age, never mind mature enough to cobble together an authentic, creative work of fiction.

As Tevye put it in Fiddler on the Roof, modern children, sigh. They drive you up the wall and kill you with their silliness, and then they turn around and teach you a thing or two. Respect, kids.

10 comments:

  1. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  2. OOOps sory abt that one up there...too many ridiculous errors. Here goes another attempt: kudos to these "kids" for their ginormous feats.I toil hard and scratch my head sore everytime i try to write an essay or article of sorts, books i have never even dreamt about them, so, I am all praise for the efforts these guys had made. Are they in English?

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  3. At 20 all I wrote was a few funny entries in my diary. The idea of a book or even an article never entered my thoughts back then. It seems kids nowadays grow up faster and faster. Young people achieving big things make one feel so unaccomplished, so old, and make you wonder what you have been doing all these years...

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  4. No, jay-me, they're all in Mizo. But whatever the language, it's just mind-blowing esp. for folks like us who slog it over even a simple blog post!

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  5. I knowwww, ambs. Maybe they have more resources open to them. Like in my time, you wrote stuff by hand or typed on clunky typewriters, but now they have computers and laptops...But even then, to actually work on and achieve a dream that big at such a young age is just amazing. Yep, and makes you go D-uh?

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  6. Kids these days...kudos to them. When do they find the time between KTP-ing and texting and TV? :)

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  7. English vekin i tia..a tha khawp mai..kan hriathiam chin chu.

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  8. Wow! Miss, i va han dah lungrun thiam ve aw..!Wow! Miss, i va han dah lungrun thiam ve aw..!

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  9. Lungrun ami, Ts? Ty ti mai ang.

    Mp, i lehkhabu sipel chawp leh dictionary keu chung a ka chhiar ang deuhin ka blog hi i lo chhiar animaw?:D Ti tha reng² e. Lo ziak zel ru, Tsa nen khan, in fakawm tawp.

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