Nobita —のび太—

My son is a Nobita type of elementary school student.  If the Doraemon manga series accurately portrays human characters, then some people are like Takeshi “Gian” – aggressive, intimidating and vengeful.  Some are like Suneo – proud, spoiled and cunning.  Some are like Shizuka – kind, sweet and innocent.  And some are like Nobita – absent-minded and cowardly, yet kind-hearted. 

My wife had planned to cook pasta for dinner two nights ago.  Then my son came home in a panic.  One of the girls in his class was in charge of some art project at school, and wanted everyone to bring in two empty cup noodle pots to paint, by the next day. 

“We don’t have any empty cup noodle pots.  Can’t it wait until next week?” I said. 

“Daddy, she wants them for tomorrow,” said Nobita.  “And she’s really scary when she is angry.” 

So the pasta was cancelled, and my wife and I had cup noodles and salad for dinner instead. 

“And what did you make with the cup noodle pots?” we asked him the next day. 

“Oh, we didn’t use them,” said Nobita.  “She changed her mind.”

 

Vocabulary:

intimidating – having a frightening or threatening effect [eg., “He is a boxer, and so most people find him physically intimidating.”]

vengeful – seeking to take revenge for a perceived injury [eg., “The vengeful ex-prisoner tried to find the man who put him into prison, to punish him for his actions.”]

spoiled – of a person, especially a child: having a bad character due to being treated too leniently or over-indulged [eg., “That rich kid gets everything he wants from his parents.  And he’s become such a spoiled brat.”]

absent-minded – lacking concentration; tending to daydream [eg., “You forgot to bring home your school bag again?  Don’t be so absent-minded!]

cowardly – lacking in bravery [eg., “The cowardly man ran away from the fight.”]

You Dirty Rats —このドブネズミ野郎—

According to the BBC, the Australian state of Queensland has been battling a plague of rats and mice for months. 

They are moving in large numbers from inland areas to the coast in search of food.  Many die before reaching the coast, and so piles of rats have been washing up on riverbanks along the route. 

One local resident was quoted as saying, “Mate, there are rats everywhere.” 

It doesn’t sound good.  Are rats on course to challenge humans for dominance of the world?  Here are the thoughts of some writers on the subject of rats:

 "Sir?" 

"Hey?" said Gavroche again. 

"Why don't you have a cat?" 

"I did have one," replied Gavroche, "I brought one here, but [the rats] ate

her."

From “Les Miserables” by Victor Hugo 

*

A few rats versus a cat makes for a happy cat.  A plague of rats versus a cat makes for a cat buffet. 

“The rat gave birth. Six little ones...cute baby rats... None of them are like Hitler.”

From “The Push Man and Other Stories” by Yoshihiro Tatsumi 

*

At least rats aren’t evil.  Are they really such a problem? 

“You want proof evolution is for real, don’t waste your time with fossils; just check out the New York City rat. They started out as immigrants, stowaways in some ship’s cargo hold. Only the survivors got to breed, and they’ve been improving with every new

litter. Smarter, faster, stronger. Getting ready to rule. Manhattan wouldn’t be the first island they took over.”

From “Another Life” by Andrew Vachss 

*

Yes.  Fear the rats.

 “One night, in the warehouse of a grocery chain, I saw some egg-stealing rats at work. They worked in pairs. A small rat would straddle an egg and clutch it in his four paws. When he got a good grip on it, he'd roll over on his back. Then a bigger rat would grab him by the tail and drag him across the floor to a hole in the baseboard, a hole leading to a burrow.”

From “Writing New York: A Literary Anthology” by Joseph Mitchell 

*

They’re smarter than you think.

 

Building a Path to Heaven －天国までの道を作ること

It occurred to me today that God is in the construction business.  “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.” 

So maybe our image of what God is and what God wants from us has been wrong.  Imagine God with a hard hat on his head, a cigarette between his lips, a high visibility jacket over his work clothes, and his hands shovelling ingredients into a mixer.  He is watching the mixing process carefully, making sure that it is just the right consistency to make a new universe. 

With this view of the creator deity, what would be required to get into heaven? 

After his heart attack, the priest steps up to the holy gates.  A rough looking angel puts down a can of grease he has been using to oil the holy hinges. 

“Ho there, mate,” says the angel.  “Where do you think you’re going?” 

The priest turns away from the gates to heaven nervously.  “Am I not able to enter?” he asks.  “I have always tried to live a good life, sitting in quiet contemplation of God.” 

“You can’t get in till you pass the test first,” says the angel. 

The priest starts thinking furiously.  I never killed anyone.  I think I loved my neighbor, didn’t I?  I led a quiet life, full of prayers every day.  Won’t that make God happy? 

The angel hands over an exam paper, and the priest scans down the list of questions. 

Q1 - What have you built to add to the universe? Q2 -  Did you leave God’s universe as neat and tidy as you found it.  Q3 - How many sick days did you take off?  Q4 - How dirty and scratched have your hands become? 

“Oh, bugger,” thinks the priest.

 

Double Meanings －ダブル・ミーニング－

1 - Why did a small European republic order a second helping of Christmas pudding?

Because it was Hungary. 

2 - Why does Santa always keep an umbrella in his sleigh? 

Because of all the rain, dear.

 

Those were two examples of the sort of puns you might find in a Christmas cracker.  A pun is a kind of joke which uses the fact that one sound or word can have two different meanings, or can be very similar to another word.  This gives the joke a double meaning. 

Since this is a blog for non-native speakers of English, I will spell out the double meanings in my simple puns.  “Hungary” sounds like “hungry” in the first one.  And “rain, dear” sounds like “reindeer” in the second. 

In Britain, we have a tradition of pulling crackers at Christmas with our families, which break apart with a little bang.  There is often a colourful paper party hat inside, and a Christmas themed pun.  They are not meant to be hilariously funny.  They are simple so that everyone in the family, including children and idiots can understand them. 

I read a news story today about an unfortunate and accidental pun which caused trouble in an Australian supermarket.  The supermarket wanted to encourage customers to eat ham instead of turkey or chicken for Christmas.  So they prepared a Christmas themed meal pack of ham, and wrote on the front, “Merry Ham-mas!” 

The Australian Jewish Association “politely suggested that it be removed from sale because of the unintentional likeness to Hamas, which is a proscribed terrorist group in Australia.”

 

Vocabulary:

to be proscribed – to be forbidden by law; to be illegal

 

Trial by Apple －林檎による審理－

You believe you have found a witch, but you cannot be completely sure. 

Perhaps your crops have failed.  Perhaps an ugly wart has grown on your face.  You think that the old woman living at the edge of town is putting curses on you.  Whatever the reason for your suspicions, you need a way to test whether that old woman is a witch or not. 

So here is what you do: 

You tie the woman’s hands behind her back and throw her into a river.  If she somehow manages to float to the surface, then she must be a witch.  How else could she have escaped but with the Devil’s assistance?  Burn her! 

If, instead, she sinks to the bottom then she was not a witch after all.  Good for her.  She is probably dead, but at least her soul is now in heaven. 

This trial by water was really used in 16^th and 17^th century Europe to find witches.  It seems pretty unfair on the suspect, who either drowned or was burned to death at the stake. 

To remember this awful trial, at Halloween we play a game with children called ducking for apples.  We float some apples in a bucket of water.  Without using their hands, the children have to put their face into the bucket and pick an apple out with their teeth.  I did it this year with my son.  Last year he couldn’t do it without help.  This year he succeeded at last.  I knew it – he is a witch!

 

Vocabulary:

crops – plants or vegetables grown by farmers

a wart – a small, hard growth on the skin, caused by a virus