Thinking of Razvon

So the other day I was sitting around and I thought of Razvon. 

Not sure of his last name but it was something along the lines of Serbineskcuo or something. He sat behind me in Geometry class in 10th grade. I think we were seated in alphabetical order or whatever.

Anyway, Razvon was foreign from I don't know where. Kazakhstan? Uzbekistan? He barely spoke any english and his look was way off. Cordoroy highwaters everyday. Overly striped shirts. His hair was differently gelled. His bookbag was like a weird briefcase. He was profoundly foreign. And I remember wondering how Razvon could even sit through regular classes. I mean how can you learn Geometry if you barely speak english!? (Of course he ended up doing much better in Geometry than I did. Probably got a higherer grade in english too.)

Every morning before class I'd try to strike up a quick conversation with Razvon. Once he told me (in broken english) something about how he's not sure where to park his car when he gets to school. This was 10th grade! No one in 10th grade drove to school! I asked him how old he was and he said 15. I asked him how he was allowed to drive to school at 15. He said it was because of his visa or whatever. I was like... ok... ummm.... ok.

Sometimes I'd see Razvon outside eating lunch by himself under a tree or whatever and I felt a little bad for him. He seemed to be alone alot. He was such an outsider. I guess I could have befriended him by reaching out more -but unfortunately I probably wasn't confident enough for teenage social heroics by really reaching out to Razvon. So we kept our relationship to simple friendly geometric pleasantries. 

Then one day Razvon walked into class and he was decked out like a metal head. Jeans jacket, ripped rock t-shirt, boots with chains, done up hair. He sat down behind me and I pretended not to notice his new look. I assumed he found MTV and was trying something out or whatever. I turned around and said hello as usual. And in response he put put his fist up showing me his skull ring and said one word.... "Flesh" (At the time Billy Idol was huge and Flesh for Fantasy rocked supreme) then Razvon looked down and started drawing skulls all over the outside of his notebook.

It turned out Razvon (who soon after dropped the 'von' and became just 'Raz') had found a home within the fold of metalheads. They took him under their devil wings and accepted Razvon as one of their own. And he took to it like a metal duck in metal water. I always felt happy for Razvon after that day. He found a home at school. He found an in. He found Billy Idol. I was way respectful of our metalheads for having the balls to see beyond the foreign and see the Raz inside Razvon Serbineskcuo. (Plus he drove to school before anyone else--- which rocked!)

So that was that with Razvon. Respect to all metalheads and good vibes to ya!

tOdd