Dear Santa, all I want for Christmas is... －サンタさんへ、クリスマスにほしいのは・・・－

Have you ever written a letter to Santa Claus?

If you did, what would you ask for?

How about peace on Earth?

Don’t be stupid.  He has the magic ability to stop time and visit every child on Earth in a single night.  But he’s not a miracle-worker.

How about asking Santa for cash?  Or the phone number of the beautiful woman or handsome guy you saw on the train the other day?

No, no.  That won’t work either.  Santa is a strict moralist.  He only gives presents that are appropriate for a humble and deserving person.  If you asked for something inappropriate, he would put your name on the list of bad boys and girls, who don’t get any presents.

Well, are you stuck for ideas?  What is an appropriate present to ask Santa for?

Here is an idea taken from an old song.  It was written in 1944 and first performed by Spike Jones and the City Slickers.

 

- All I Want For Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth ‐

　

Every body Pauses and stares at me

These two teeth are gone as you can see

I don't know just who to blame for this catastrophe!

But my one wish on Christmas Eve is as plain as it can be!

All I want for Christmas

is my two front teeth

 

Vocabulary:

the other day – a day in the recent past

a moralist – someone with a strong sense of what is right and what is wrong.

to be humble – to be modest; not proud; to have small desires.

to be stuck for ideas – to be unable to think of anything.

to blame someone – to say that something is someone’s fault.  For example, my boss blamed me for the company’s poor sales this month.

a catastrophe – a serious disaster.

to be plain – to be obvious

 

Nerima English

http://nerimaenglish.jimdo.com/

 

 

 

Don’t forget the Christmas spirit (a warning from Charles Dickens) －クリスマスの精神を忘れずに （チャールズ・ディケンズからの警告）－

This is my last blog post before Christmas, so let me wish all of my students a Merry Christmas!

Charles Dickens was an English writer and in 1843 he wrote “A Christmas Carol”.  It was a reminder to his readers not to forget that Christmas is a time for doing good in the world.  We should be charitable towards others.

So, I have edited a section from A Christmas Carol, where the greedy and seemingly heartless businessman called Scrooge is visited by the ghost of his dead partner, Marley.  Make sure you don’t forget the Christmas ¹spirit.  The Christmas ²spirit hasn’t forgotten you!

An edited scene from Charles Dicken’s “A Christmas Carol”

As Scrooge sat down, every bell in his house rang out loudly.

This might have lasted half a minute, or a minute, but it seemed an hour. The bells ceased as they had begun, together. They were followed by a clanking noise, deep down below; as if some person were dragging a heavy chain.

“It’s nonsense,” said Scrooge.  “I won’t believe it.”

His colour changed though, when, without a pause, Marley’s ghost came through the heavy door.

The chain he pulled was wound about his middle. It was long, and was made of cash-boxes, keys, etc. His body was transparent; so that Scrooge could see the door behind him.

“Who are you?” asked Scrooge.

“Ask me who I was,” replied the ghost.

“Who were you then?” said Scrooge.

“In life I was your partner, Jacob Marley”.

“Can you -- can you sit down?” asked Scrooge, looking doubtfully at him.

The ghost sat down on the opposite side of the fireplace, as if he were quite used to it.

“You don’t believe in me,” observed the ghost.

“I don’t,” said Scrooge. “A little thing can affect one’s senses. A slight disorder of the stomach makes them cheats. You may  be an undigested bit of beef, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of an underdone potato. There's more of  gravy than of grave about you, whatever you are!”

The truth was that Scrooge tried to be smart to keep down his terror.

At this the spirit raised a frightful cry, and shook its chain.

Scrooge fell upon his knees, and clasped his hands before his face.

“Mercy!” he said. “Dreadful spirit, why do you trouble me?”

“It is required of every man,” the Ghost returned, “that the spirit within him should walk among his fellow men, and travel far and wide; and if that spirit doesn’t do that in life, it is condemned to do so after death.”

“I wear the chain I made in life,” said the ghost. “And I have come to warn you before it is too late.”

Scrooge trembled more and more.

“Do you want to know the length of the chain you are making for yourself?” asked the ghost... 

Vocabulary:

¹spirit – Feeling.

²a spirit – A ghost.

to be charitable – To be generous; to donate money.

to cease – To stop.

clanking – Noise like metal hitting against something.

to drag something – To pull something heavy.

to be wound around something – To be put many times around something, often to loosely attach it.

to be transparent – If something is transparent, it can be seen through.  For example, glass is usually transparent.

a disorder – A problem; a malfunction.

to be undigested – Not absorbed by the body.  The stomach digests food after it is eaten.

a crumb – A very small piece, especially of food like bread or biscuits.

a fragment – A small piece.  For example, after the glass smashed there were many small fragments.

to be underdone – Not cooked enough.

terror – Great fear

to clasp something – To hold something tightly

mercy – Being kind or showing forgiveness to someone you could harm.

to be dreadful – To be terrible.

to be condemned – To be given a punishment.  For example, the murderer was condemned to death.

to tremble – For your body to shake, perhaps with fear or cold.

 

 

Dreaming in tartan about Dumbarton (is not good for you)

This week’s blog is about a recent song by a Scottish band called Dumb Instrument.  The article title is from a line of the song, “Suffering from Scottishness”.  Dumbarton is a small town near Glasgow.

The song mentions a number of stereotypical images of Scotland, including shortbread, which in the U.K. can sometimes also be called shortcake, and tartan.

The song makes fun of Scottish people’s image of themselves.  We are a small country compared to our neighbour, England, and we often feel small as a nation and lack confidence, like the character in this song: “I think I've failed when I'm only starting”.  There is also a stereotyped image that Scots drink too much alcohol and that this can lead to violent behaviour.  (That’s not a fair image, I hope!)

The song is a kind of short story.  The main character is Scottish and it begins in a taxi in Brighton, a town in England.

The main character complains to the English taxi-driver that he is depressed because he is Scottish.  He is embarrassed by stereotypical Scottish imagery like shortbread and tartan.  He is also unhappy about the Scottish national character, which he has too.  He remembers looking at himself in the mirror and realising how unhappy he was with his Scottishness.

The taxi-driver takes pity on him and tries to cheer him up by stopping the taxi and taking him for a drink in a nearby pub.  Unfortunately, the main character has too much to drink and gets violent, hitting the taxi-driver with his beer glass.  Then the taxi-driver is also suffering from Scottishness.

Here are the lyrics.  I have edited it a little to make it easier to understand.  Note that “gless” is just “glass” spoken with a Scottish accent. 

Suffering from Scottishness by Dumb Instrument

It was windy,
Trees were {bending}.
I was staring at my knee.

I was in Brighton, in a taxi.
{The} taxi driver says to me,
"What's wrong pal you look depressed?"
I said, "I'm suffering from Scottishness:

 

Oh for Christ sake!
I like shortcake,
And if I'm happy it feels fake.
I dream in tartan about Dumbarton.
I think I've failed when I'm only starting.
Oh yes, I must confess,
That I'm suffering from Scottishness.

There was one day {that} felt like something
In the toilet of a bar.
Then the {guy} , in the mirror
He says, ‘Who do you think you are?
You're nothing, you're just a mess.
You're an advert for Scottishness’."

 

{The} taxi driver he stopped the cab.
He marched me straight to the nearest pub.
His arm around me, he did his best
To make me see how my life was blessed.
So I {hit} him with my gless.
Now he's suffering from Scottishness.

 

 

Vocabulary:

to Suffer – To feel bad; to feel pain.

a stereotype (adjective: stereotypical) – A common image of something which is often too simple and inaccurate.

shortbread – A sweet biscuit from Scotland made with butter.

tartan – A multi-coloured pattern found on traditional Scottish clothing.

to be depressed – To be very unhappy.

to take pity on someone – To feel sorry for someone; to do something to help because you feel bad for someone.

to cheer someone up – To make someone feel happier.

to bend – To change shape and become curved.

to stare – To look fixedly.

pal – Friend.  In the U.K. it is okay to call a stranger “Pal” in a casual setting (if they are men).

“For Christ’s sake!” – This is an expression used to show exasperation, annoyance etc.

to confess – To admit something.

a cab – A taxi.

to march someone somewhere – To force someone to go somewhere.  For example, the policeman marched him to the police station.

to be blessed – To be in a happy situation; to be lucky or favoured by God.

 

Making a verbal map

This, or something similar, has happened to me a number of times.  I am walking across the road, or along a train platform and someone will shout to me, “Abunai!” (It’s dangerous!)  Then I think, “Well, what’s dangerous?  Is it dangerous in front of me?  Behind me?  To the side?  Should I stop?  Speed up, perhaps?” 

I will then stop and say, “Doko ga abunai?” (Where is the danger?)  Then the reply will come, “Asoko!” (Over there!)

Needless to say, this kind of vague direction will only confuse the situation.

So how do blind people make best use of directions?  Well, someone I know works for a volunteer group which makes “verbal maps”, or directions for the blind or visually impaired.  If a blind person wants to go from, say, Takadanobaba Station to the Nihon Tenji Toshokan (Japan Braille Library), they can access an application which will give directions from the station to the library, which is a short walk away.

The important thing is to give concrete directions from point to point, A to B, B to C, C to D etc.

For example, for a sighted person, these directions might be sufficient:  Exit the train station.  You will see an intersection up ahead.  Cross the road at the intersection... etc.

For a blind person, you would have to break down the short journey into a series of smaller steps.  For example: With the exit gates at your back, follow the Braille blocks for 15 metres.  You will come to a four-way intersection.  Take the left path at the 9 o’clock direction and follow the Braille blocks for 20 metres.  You will come to a busy road with a set of traffic lights.... etc.

To make a helpful verbal map, you just have to imagine yourself looking at the route from the same position as the person who will walk along it.  And you have to describe things you can feel, not see, or give directions people can follow clearly, like directions based upon the numbers on a clock face.

Now, if you have a good imagination, you can make your own verbal maps if you meet me on the street and want to help me get somewhere...
 

Vocabulary:

to be vague – To be unclear; without detail.

to be visually impaired – To be not fully sighted, but not necessarily completely blind.

Braille – This is a system of writing for blind people.  It uses dots which can be felt instead of characters which can be read.

to be concrete – To contain real details; not abstract.

an intersection – The point where two or more roads or paths meet.

Braille blocks – These are things which are put on the ground to make a path for blind people to follow.  They are usually yellow and can often be seen in and around train stations.

 

 

Don’t open the box!

An acquaintance of mine recently wrote a short story based upon the Japanese folk-tale, Urashima Taro, which got me thinking about the story. 

I am sure that every Japanese person will be familiar with the story.  There are a number of different versions, but the most common is as follows:

Urashima Taro is a young man who sees a small sea-turtle being tortured by some children on the beach.  He rescues the turtle, and it turns out to be a princess, the daughter of the God of the Sea.

So to thank Urashima Taro, the turtle takes him to a caslte under the sea, where he enjoys feasting and dancing for three days.  However, he gets lonely to see his village again and so asks to go home.  The princess takes him home but first gives him a magic box, saying that it will protect him and that he should on no account open it.

When Urashima Taro gets home, 300 years have passed and he doesn’t recognise anyone.  In a daze, he opens the box and a white smoke emerges, covering him.  He then turns into an old man.

And that’s the end of the story.  It seems a little bit harsh on Urashima Taro, doesn’t it?  Even though he helped the turtle, in the end he loses his family and friends, and his youth, and he only enjoyed three days in the underwater castle.

But is there a moral?  Perhaps it could mean that the God of the Sea cannot be understood by humans, and seems cruel.  In an island nation like Japan, with many disasters at sea, typhoons, tsunamis and so on, then people would have felt like this.

Or perhaps Urashima Taro lost his sense of time in the underwater castle because he was having too much fun.  While he was enjoying the feasting and dancing and talking with the princess, his family and friends were hard at work.  Maybe the moral is about hard work, about not avoiding your responsibilities.

If you have a blog to write, don’t start by checking your emails and the Scottish football gossip.  If you do, then you might forget the time and your life will pass you by!  In that case, perhaps the magic box that you should never open is your email inbox.

Thank you, Urashima Taro.  You have taught me a valuable lesson.  What’s this?  A new email!  Sorry, I’ve got to go.

 

Vocabulary:

an acquaintance – Someone you know.

a folk-tale – A traditional story, passed from person to person.

to torture someone or something – To deliberately cause extreme pain to someone or something.

“You should on no account open the box” – Whatever you do, don’t open the box./ You must not open the box, no matter what.

to be in a daze – To be confused, when your brain is not functioning properly.

to emerge – To come out.

to be harsh – To be hard or unfair.

 

 

Black dealings in Blackpool

I found an interesting story this week about a hotel in Blackpool, England.

Blackpool is a slightly odd tourist town.  There are seven miles of sandy beach, but remember that this is the north-west of England.  The temperature is rarely high.  In the 18^th and 19^th Centuries, it became popular for Britons to head to the beach to swim in summer.  Blackpool grew up as a town designed entirely to cater for these tourists.  By the 1950s, there were 17 million visitors coming every year, enjoying donkey rides on the beach, riding the trams, watching the illuminations and so on.  Of course, after the 1950s, cheap air travel became available and people found they could go to beaches in places with hot weather, like Spain.  So visitor numbers to Blackpool declined, while the city tried to create more modern attractions like amusement parks with roller-coasters.  Blackpool today is an odd mix of the quaint and modern.

 So if tourism has faced challenging conditions for many years in Blackpool, I can understand that hotels might have to work harder than ever to attract customers.  Might that partly explain the following story?

A couple stopped in Blackpool for one night recently.  Their one night stay cost 36 pounds.  They paid by credit card and then went on their way.

Then, as many people do these days, they wrote a review of the hotel on a web-site.  They weren’t happy with the hotel and wrote a very negative review.

When their credit card bill arrived, they found that 136 pounds had been deducted by the hotel.  The hotel management had “fined” them 100 pounds for writing a bad review.  Actually, the guests had signed an agreement allowing the hotel to do this, although they didn’t notice it when they signed.  It had been written in the small print of the booking agreement.  It is the hotel’s policy to avoid getting bad reviews.

This has provoked a debate.  Is the hotel stifling free speech?  Is the agreement unfair on customers?  Or perhaps are some customers not careful enough to be fair to hotels or businesses when writing their reviews?  The hotel management said that many customers have started threatening to write bad reviews on the internet just to try to get a discount.

I feel a little sorry for the hotel.  After a public outcry, they had to refund the 100 pounds to the guests.  Who knows if their complaints were really fair?  The internet has given more power to people to complain.  I like using the internet to complain too, but let’s try to be fair to those we are complaining about.

Vocabulary:

to head somewhere – To go somewhere

to cater for – To serve.

to be quaint – To be old-fashioned, but in a pleasant way; to be charming.

to be deducted – To be removed, or taken off.             

to fine somebody – To charge money to somebody as a penalty.

the small print – The details in an agreement which is written in very small letters.

to provoke something – To cause something.

to stifle something – To restrict something’s freedom, or ability to move or grow.

an outcry – When many people complain loudly.

The heart of things

This week I finished reading “Kokoro” by Soseki Natsume.  I have heard that most Japanese students study this book in high school.  So I suspect that many people will be intimately familiar with the story.

But it is not so well known in Britain.  So let me first summarise the story.  The title means “heart” but also suggests other meanings such as inner feelings or the true nature of things.

The book was written in 1914 and is set in that period, the end of the Meiji Era.  That was the era which saw the modernisation of Japan.  The book follows the relationship between the narrator, a young university student, and an older man, who lives virtually as a recluse in Tokyo with his wife.

The older man, whom the student respectfully calls “Sensei”, over the course of the book reveals the reason for his withdrawal from human society, including feelings of guilt over an incident in a complicated love-triangle and his inability to come to terms with the new modern Japan.

As a psychological study of human nature and isolation it was very interesting.  The characters are constantly misunderstanding one another and even themselves.  They are contradictory and often show completely conflicting desires.  As a small example, the narrators’ parents are desperate to see their son and urge him to come back from university.  After the first few days, they get annoyed with having him there and wish he would leave.  When he decides to go back to Tokyo, however, they ask him to stay longer.  The complexity of the human mind, which pushes and pulls in different directions at the same time, and can never be fully understood by others is brilliantly explored.

I must admit that I did also get a bit annoyed by the character of Sensei, however.  He had grown up influenced not just by the modern Japan, but the older values as well.  Every relationship he had was strictly governed by rules, ritual and obligation.  He gave advice to his friend K, and felt completely bound by an obligation to help him at great cost to himself because the advice brought some difficulties.  He delays declaring his love for someone for a number of reasons, including fears that it might cause him embarrassment or was not correct according to custom.

As a modern, selfish man brought up in an individualistic culture, I kept thinking, “Just do it!  Stop worrying so much about what other people think!” or similar thoughts.  If old Japan was really as strict as Sensei shows it to be, then it must have been a hard place to live.

Actually, it’s not always that easy even now...
 

Vocabulary:

to be intimately familiar with something – To know something extremely well.
virtually – Almost entirely.

a recluse – Someone who lives completely apart from other people.

a love-triangle – When two people love the same person, it is a love-triangle.

to come to terms with something – To accept something; to be able to deal with something.

psychological – To do with the way people think.

isolation – Being alone.

to be contradictory – To contain two opposites.  For example, “I like cats but I don’t like cats”, is a contradictory statement.

conflicting – Opposite or not in agreement.

to urge someone to do something – To strongly encourage someone to do something.

complexity – Being complex; the opposite of simplicity.

ritual – A ceremony, or a traditional, formal action.

obligation – A responsibility to do something.  For example, “He helped me, so I have an obligation to help him in return.”

to be bound – To be unable to move; to be tied up.
 

 

 

Bear Mountain picnic

Over the long weekend, I went on a short hike with my wife and her sister and two young nieces.  One of the girls is a first grade elementary school student and the other is a sixth grade student.  So, as you can imagine, we chose a hike that was not too long or difficult. 

We climbed to the top of Mount Tenran (Tenran-zan), in Hanno.  We climbed a steep slope with wooden steps to get to the top.  For most people it probably wasn’t a difficult climb, but for a blind guy and a first grader it was pretty taxing.

One of the first things we noticed was a sign that warned that bears had been spotted in the area.  My wife’s younger niece asked if I was swinging my stick in front of me to keep the bears away.  I rather like the idea.

We were all tired when we reached the top and so took a break to have a picnic.  We had onigiri and mikan.  Actually, we had onigiri, mikan and fried chicken which my sister-in-law had brought.  She obviously hasn’t been reading my blog.  I decided not to tell her that I had become a semi-vegetarian and just ate it.  I must admit that it tasted nice.

The real difficulties began on the way down.  We took a different route down the mountain.  Instead of wooden steps, there were boulders, mud and a more gradual slope to the bottom.  Unfortunately, I hadn’t checked my shoes very carefully before I came out.  They were an old pair of shoes and the soles had worn completely smooth.  The day we went hiking, Sunday, was dry.  But the previous day it had rained heavily and the boulders and mud were still wet.

So I was slipping and sliding the whole way down, holding on to my wife’s arm and using my bear-stick to test the ground in front of me and to help support my weight.  I nearly fell over a number of times and other hikers were shouting out encouragement or warnings.

We made it to the ground in the end.  My trousers and shoes were covered in mud and everybody’s legs were sore.  But we weren’t eaten by bears and we got home safely.

I think the bears must have been frightened off by my bear-stick.
 

Vocabulary:

a long weekend – If Monday is a public holiday, we call this a long weekend.

to be taxing – To be tiring; to cost a lot of energy.

to spot something – To see or notice something.

a boulder – A big rock.

gradual - Happening slowly.

a number of – Several.

 

A grave message...

Today’s post covers the delicate topic of death and people’s reaction to it, including humour. 

British culture is characterised by a cynical and often black sense of humour.  Do you find this story a little bit funny or are you sorry for the person affected?

To summarise the story, an elderly lady passed away.  When someone dies in the U.K. it is common to bury them with some personal items they were fond of: a teddy bear, perhaps, or a football scarf.

Well, apparently this elderly lady was fond of sending text messages and using her mobile phone.  So she was buried with her mobile phone.  This happened three years ago or so.

This deceased lady’s granddaughter continued to send text messages to her grandmother even after she had died.  Of course she knew that her grandmother couldn’t read them but sending the messages gave her comfort.  “I know she’s not alive.  But it’s still going to her,” she said.  So far it’s a sweet story, right?

But then after three years of this, the granddaughter received a reply.  It said, “I’m watching over you.”

The granddaughter’s reaction was then quite strange.  She said: "Loads of horrible things were running through my head.

"How did somebody get her telephone? Had they been getting all the texts?"

So, she imagined that someone had dug up the grave in order to steal the phone.  This is not the first explanation that she should have considered!

In reality, the phone company had given the old number to someone else, because it had not been in use for three years.  So a stranger was getting the text messages that the granddaughter was sending and, being a cynical Briton with a black sense of humour, he assumed that his friends were playing a prank on him.

The granddaughter said, “I took it out on him.  But it wasn’t his fault at all.”

I’m sorry but I found the story quite amusing.  I am sure that amongst us cynical Britons, I wasn’t the only one.

Vocabulary:

a delicate topic – A sensitive subject; something which is difficult to talk about.

A is characterised by B – Something distinctive about A is B.

to be cynical – If you are cynical then you don’t respect things as they appear, or make fun of things.

to pass away – To die.  It sounds more polite to say that someone passed away, rather than that they died.

to bury something – To put it in the ground, under the earth.

to be deceased – To be dead.  It sounds more polite to say deceased rather than dead.

loads of... – Lots of...; a large pile of...

to dig something up – To take something out of the ground.

a grave – The place where someone is buried

a prank – Telling someone a false story as a joke.  For example, people often play pranks on each other on April Fool’s Day.

a Briton – Someone from Britain

to take it out on someone – To get rid of some negative feeling like anger by attacking or blaming someone.

Sorry, you are a “semi”-vegetarian?

To understand this week’s blog entry, you must first understand the prefix “semi-”.  Draw a circle on a piece of paper.  Now draw a line down the middle, cutting it in half.  You now have two semi-circles.  So “semi-something” means half-something or part-something.  If you are a semi-skilled worker then you are less skilled than a “skilled worker”, and more skilled than an “unskilled worker”. 

What got me thinking about this prefix was telling someone that I had become a “semi-vegetarian”.  He laughed.  I think I can see why.  He felt that I should either be a vegetarian or not be one. 

But let me explain myself.  First, I don’t eat meat at home.  If I go to a restaurant and all of the dishes contain meat then I will just eat meat instead of trying to find another restaurant.  My own convenience is also important.  I am sure I would eat my own students if I was hungry enough and there was no tofu around! 

Also, I eat fish.  I am not against eating animals.  Humans are omnivores, and we evolved eating animals.  But the way we usually farm food like chickens and cows is so terrible for the animals that it is no longer natural.  It is a kind of cruel torture.  I would be happy if animals could be farmed more expensively, giving them enough space to move around and the chance to live without too much suffering.  Meat would then be very expensive but perhaps we could eat less of it. 

If fish are not farmed, and are caught directly from the ocean, I feel that they had some chance to live life naturally before being eaten to sustain another’s life.  So I don’t object to eating fish.  If meat, eggs etc. are clearly labelled “free range”, then I think that is okay too, but it is usually very difficult to tell how meat products were produced. 

I am not trying to campaign on this issue.  I don’t get angry about other people’s opinions on eating meat.  I am just a semi-writer giving a semi-opinion.

 

Vocabulary:

a prefix – Something which is added to the start of a word to change its meaning.  For example, “unclear” contains the prefix “un”.

an omnivore – An omnivore is an animal which eats both plants and meat.  A carnivore eats only meat and a herbivore eats only plants.

torture – Extreme pain which is caused deliberately.

to sustain something – To support something; to enable it to continue.

free range – In free range animal products, the animals were given enough space to walk around freely.  Most meat is factory farmed.  That means that the animals cannot move, probably for their whole life.

 

A cat lover by nature

Are you a cat lover?  I am.  When I was young, my family bought a cat from a dog and cat home.  That means that she had been owned by another family who had decided they didn’t want her and gave her away.

So we didn’t decide her name.  She already had the name “Domino”, since she was a white cat with black spots.  A domino is a small rectangular black block with white spots, used in a game.  So the name was quite appropriate. 

Domino was very shy and nervous at first.  She didn’t like to be touched by humans much and would sometimes turn around and give us a warning bite if we tried to pet her.  I would probably be shy and nervous if I had been thrown out by my family too. 

But after many months and years she got used to people.  She became very friendly and would jump onto your lap to be petted.  You could say that over time she learned to change her nature. 

But Aesop would disagree.  Below is another one of his fables, in which he suggests that someone or something’s essential nature can never change. 

He also has a different idea of what is meant by a ‘cat lover’...

 

The Cat Maiden 

The gods were once disputing whether it was possible for a living being to change its nature.  The king of the gods said "Yes," but the goddess of love said "No."

So, to resolve the dispute, the king of the gods turned a cat into a maiden, and gave her to a young man for a wife.  The wedding was duly performed and the young couple sat down to the wedding-feast.

"See," said the king of the gods, "how appropriately she behaves.  Who could tell that yesterday she was but a cat?  Surely her nature has changed?"

"Wait a minute," replied the goddess of love, and let loose a mouse into the room.  No sooner did the bride see this than she jumped up from her seat and tried to pounce upon the mouse.  "Ah, you see," said the goddess of love,

"Nature will out."

 

Vocabulary:

rectangular – The shape has four sides.  It is like a square, but two of the sides are longer than the other two.

a dispute – An argument or discussion with opposing sides.

a maiden – A young, unmarried woman.

“The wedding was duly performed” – 1. The wedding was soon thereafter performed. /  2. The wedding was properly carried out.

to let loose something – To release something, especially something dangerous.  For example, don’t let loose the dog.

“No sooner did the bride see this than she jumped up” – The bride saw this and then immediately jumped up.