During the lunch break, Lisa spotted the young foreigner at the back of the cafeteria line. Tiptoeing up behind him, she tapped his shoulder and said bashfully, "Hi, Vladimir."

As the lad turned around, not only his eyes but his entire face seemed to pierce her soul. "Ah," he said liltingly. "You are Lisa Simpson, are you not?"

"Er, yes," she replied, chuckling to hide the thrill she felt that he knew her name.

"You are, as they say, a nerd," said Vladimir with a cold, but not unfriendly, tone.

Oh my God, even the exchange students know I'm a nerd, thought Lisa, her heart plummeting. Do I give off nerdy pheromones, or what?

"You have, as they say, a big butt," Vladimir went on, "which is a result of eating, as they say, too many birthday cakes."

It dawned on Lisa what was odd about the boy's speech. "Wait a minute," she interrupted him. "As who says?"

Vladimir pointed a clammy-looking finger at a table where Sherri and Terri exchanged gossip from opposite ends. "As they say," was his response.

"Hmm," said Lisa, narrowing her eyes.

He made a hint of a smile. "They say such things because they are jealous," he said, reaching stiffly for a food tray.

"Jealous of me?" said Lisa.

"Yes," said Vladimir. "They are two of a kind, but you are unique."

He called me unique, Lisa gushed to herself. My heart hasn't pounded so wildly since I was accepted into Mensa!

Vladimir looked up at a visage even more grim and death-like than his own, that of Lunch Lady Doris. "What'll it be, Igor?" she rasped.

He glanced over the culinary selections—a brown mass that was labeled MYSTERY MEAT, and a scarlet ooze identified as MYSTERY VEGETABLE. "I will have the red okra, please," he stated.

"The what?" said Doris, taken aback.

"What you call 'Mystery Vegetable' is called red okra in my country," Vladimir explained. "And what you call 'Mystery Meat' is also known as textured soy protein."

The cafeteria lady gave the earnest-faced boy a blank stare. "I'll be damned," was all she managed.

The kids ahead of Vladimir whirled, their jaws hanging in stupefaction. "He…he…" stammered Lewis. "He knows what the mystery meat is!"

"Textured soy protein, huh?" said Nelson. "Now I'm angry."

"I thought it was giraffe," said Ralph disappointedly.

"Aaaagh!" cried Database. "Now that we know, we'll be killed!"

After the excitement had died down, Lisa joined Vladimir at a nearby table. "What you did was amazing," she complimented him. "I wouldn't have guessed red okra in a million years. I was close on the mystery meat, though. My guess was hydrolyzed soy protein."

Vladimir grinned and took an eager bite of the okra on his plate. "This is delicious," he remarked. "It is also a very pleasing shade of red."

Lisa sighed happily. "Tell me about Karjakistan," she urged him. "I thought I knew all the former Soviet republics, but that's one I've never heard of."

He hardly paused between bites as he spoke. "Karjakistanis are renowned for their laziness," he related. "They did not officially separate from the Soviet Union until fifteen years after the breakup. There is still a statue of Lenin in my town square, but nobody wants to tear it down."

"Really," said Lisa. "How interesting."

"I lived on a vegetable farm in the capital city," Vladimiar went on. "My parents taught me how to plant and grow all kinds of vegetables, and about the nutrients they contain."

"Wow," said Lisa, astonished. "I guess you're an expert, then."

Vladimir nodded. "All the vitamins and minerals we need to live are in the soil," he said with conviction. "It is not necessary to kill any living thing."

Lisa's eyes went wide. "You're a vegetarian," she enthused. "So am I!"

He smiled broadly, flashing his prominent canine teeth. "It is good to meet an American vegetarian," he said. "Before I left Karjakistan, I believed that Americans ate meat from the bone for every meal."

"Believe it or not, there are tons of vegetarians here," Lisa told him. "Paul McCartney's one, and so are Shania Twain, and Richard Gere, and Bob Dylan, and Martina Navratilova, and Tom Cruise, and…"

"Tom Cruise?" Vladimir's face lit up. "He is my favorite movie star. He is wonderful when he plays a vampire."

"Don't get me started on vampires," said Lisa. "I only wish they were real."

The boy's voice took on a serious tone. "Karjakistanis are very superstitious. They believe that vampires live in the hills, and come down at night to drink the blood of the living."

"Do you believe any of that?" Lisa asked him.

Vladimir shook his head. "Not all vampires are the same. Some merely want to be accepted."

To be continued