as kryptonite is to superman

Its the end of the year and time for the round of Parent-Teacher meetings. Isaac did very well, topping his class in three of the subjects, failing in Chinese as usual. But this time, surprise surprise, there was actually an improvement. Last year, he was last in class for Chinese - beaten by even his Indian, ang-moh classmates! This year, he was third from the bottom and had registered a 100% increase in marks gained - that is, he used to get 7, now he's got 15! We think its due to Kumon and we're hoping that he will be able to buck up enough to at least pass chinese in the PSLE.

Mr Philip, his form teacher, related this to us - he was invigilating the chinese composition paper and was walking around the class when he stopped at Isaac's desk. Our friend had, on his entire sheet of paper, TWO lines. Mr Philip said: "I couldn't say a lot but I had to drop a hint, so I told him - I think you better write some more. I went round the class again and when I came back to him, it was still just two lines!!" Mr Philip added: "Chinese to him is like kryptonite to superman!"