Stephen Henighan, a Romanian grammar book, and hours of language tapes under his belt, billets with a family as an English teacher in Moldova, a country born from the dismantling of Romania during World War II. As a Westerner in this "lost province" and former Soviet republic, Henighan feels he's an unnerving disappointment for many Moldovans, especially to the MTV-addicted, twenty-year-old Andrei. The author doesn't own his own home, is unable to use his English to communicate with singer Michael Jackson, and has inadequate knowledge of the prices of the latest North American gadgets.As a Canadian, Henighan feels at home in this nation adrift. Fifty years of Soviet propaganda have dictated that the Moldovan language is a "degenerate local patios, only distantly related to Romanian." The innocent observation by the author that Moldovan and Romanian are the same language is revolutionary in the tense climate of post-Soviet Moldova, and suddenly Henighan is embroiled in the fierce.