Daniil was walking back from school in the center of Khabarovsk with a winter hat that read ‘DOPE.’ I wondered if he knew what the word meant. As I stopped to talk to him, he said ”We can speak English if you like” in quite a good accent. I asked where he learned his English. He said his parents sent him and his older brother to study in Los Angeles. His brother ended up living there two years before returning home.
Daniil said he only spent a few months there and was ”surprised by the size of LA. You need two hours to get from one end to the other. It takes less than 30 minutes to get from one end of Khabarovsk to the other.” I asked him what he would like to see in Khabarovsk. ”Big modern buildings, more parks and places to bicycle,” he answered.
Daniil keeps up his English by watching US movies and TV serials on his Apple laptop at home. ”I don’t like Russian serials. They are made for old people.” Daniil said he would like to make films or videos some day and prefers detective genre.
