Memories of yesteryear, and that's the bottom line, cuz Stone Cold said so...

Why did it take me this long to find out that one hot topic of discussion among my senior-grade middle school students is... WWE pro wrestling?

I should've seen this coming, because back when I was their age, I was a fan of the (then) World Wrestling Federation as well. I've even met John Cena in person at an autograph session, before he became a household name in sports entertainment.

I was going down the hallway en route to the English classroom and a few students were playfighting, as is common at all-boys' schools here. One of them performed a pretend-wrestling move on another, and as I passed by, I gave the student a small tap on the shoulder and casually said, "No Rock Bottoms in the school, please." Both of them stopped in their tracks and went like, "OHHHHHHhhhhhh, Mr. Cheng knows WWE! Oh my God!"

After lunch, a bunch of students cornered me in the hallway and we had a nice little discussion about WWE -- and they actually used English and tried to use it to discuss pro wrestling! It was incredible how so many of those students who normally didn't participate in class are now eagerly displaying their English skills so we could both share our knowledge about the "Sport" That Vince McMahon Revolutionized.

I amazed them with my knowledge about the Radicalz (Eddie Guerrero, Dean Malenko, Perry Saturn and Chris Benoit), the Dudley Boyz (Bubba-Ray and D-Von), the Hardy Boyz (Matt and Jeff Hardy), Edge & Christian, Degeneration-X, the WCW/ECW Alliance, nWo, and others. I impressed them with first-hand memories of the Brock Lesnar superplex on Big Show that broke the ring in an old episode of Smackdown. I wow'd them with the tales of the Triple H vs. Mick Foley Hell-in-a-Cell match at No Way Out.

And all this time, I've been trying to find culturally relevant names to use in my lessons that students would know and be interested in. I can't believe all this time, it was right under my nose in the form of World Wrestling Entertainment.

If you smell what the Hermit is cookin'.