Stand Up, Miss Tanaka －田中さん、起立してください－

I was speaking to a Japanese acquaintance of mine recently, and I asked her when she first studied English. 

“When I entered junior high school,” she said. 

“And how did it go?” I asked.  “Did you do well in English at school?” 

“No,” she said.  “It was like an allergy.  I couldn’t at all.” 

I will change the name of my acquaintance and call her Hiroko Tanaka.  I asked Hiroko if anything had happened which had led to her disliking her English classes. 

She told me that in her first English class, the teacher told the students how to introduce themselves in English.  He said that they had to say their name backwards.  The teacher asked Hiroko Tanaka to stand up before the class and introduce herself in English. 

“Hello,” she said, pausing for a moment to think.  “My name is Kanata Korohi.” 

The class burst into laughter.  Instead of reversing the order of her family name and personal name, Hiroko had reversed the order of each sound. 

lishEng off you put lybabpro That.

 

Are You with the Bride, the Groom, or Neither? －新婦側、新郎側、あるいはそのどちらでもないゲストでしょうか？－

Perhaps it is because you are a foodie.  You heard about the Peking duck, fish and long noodles which are meant to represent the long life the couple will share together.  So that’s why you gatecrashed a Chinese wedding.  And you heard about the clams traditionally served at a Japanese wedding as a symbol of two halves fitting neatly together.  So that’s why you turned up at a Japanese wedding. 

Or was it to get a vicarious taste of the romance and happiness of a wedding couple?  Did you try to sneak into the wedding photo at the back, so that you could forever remember someone else’s happy day? 

I am talking about a strange phenomenon I heard about on the radio recently.  There are some websites in the U.S. which try to match people who want to go to an unknown couple’s wedding with a couple that wants strangers to attend their wedding. 

According to an American woman who was interviewed, she met 15 or so strangers and invited them to her wedding through this site.  The venue required a minimum number of guests to turn up in order to make the booking.  The American woman was marrying a British man, whose family and friends mostly could not afford to travel to America for the event.  So they filled up the shortage of required guests with strangers. 

The guests paid a little money to enjoy the fine food and drinks, and dancing to a DJ set after the meal. 

I can see the necessity in this case for the couple to find extra wedding guests.  But I wonder what the motivation of the guests was?  Do they only turn up to strangers’ weddings, or do they do other events, such as funerals?

 

Vocabulary:

to gatecrash an event – to take part in or attend an event without having permission, a ticket, etc.

[eg., I tried to invite a few friends from my school to a party at my house while my parents were away.  But some of the bad kids heard about it and gatecrashed the party.]

A vicarious (feeling) – a second hand (feeling) which is not experienced directly, but instead by listening to, watching, reading about etc. another person’s experience

[eg., I got a vicarious thrill from listening to my son’s excitement when opening his Christmas presents.]

 

I Lower Myself to the Floor to Be Judged －私は裁きを受けるため、ひれ伏します－

I was at a party last night.  I have something I would like to say to the other people at the party, which I have written below. 

Apology Letter After Drunken Improper Behaviour 

Yesterday I drank to excess.  I was drunk to an extreme that passed all limits.  My coarse and careless language was spoken from a state of unconsciousness.  Morning arrived and I heard several people speak of it.  I realized then what had happened.  There was no earth into which my body could sink.  My shame and horror were great.  The root cause was my small capacity to hold alcohol.  I thank you for your kindness in not condemning me for my behaviour.  When we next meet, I will apologise face to face.  But first I make this written apology.  I lower myself to the floor to be judged. 

Respectfully yours,

(insert name here) 

*

Okay, I didn’t really go to a party last night.  And I didn’t write this letter.  I read it recently and found it interesting.  The letter was discovered in a cave in China, and it was dated to the 9^th century Tang dynasty.  It was not an individual letter, but a form letter.  Government employees who drank too much could copy the letter any time they drank too much.  The text is based on a translation into English available online.  But I changed some of the language a little to try to keep it simple for non-native speakers. 

I hope you have more capacity than a poor 9^th century civil servant.

 

Put the Coffee Cup Down, Sir, and Put Your Hands in the Air －コーヒーカップを下して、手を挙げろー

I have a Japanese student who was in a band which toured Europe.  His band’s European tour manager was an Italian woman.  She recently visited Japan, and my student met her and showed her some of the sights of Tokyo. 

“How did it go with her?” I asked. 

“Good,” he said, “But she told me off.” 

“Why did she tell you off?” I asked. 

“Well,” he said, “She was annoyed that I was drinking my cappuccino incorrectly.” 

I had images of my student sucking his cappuccino through a straw, or slurping it into his mouth with chopsticks. 

“What was wrong with how you were drinking it?” I said. 

“Oh,” he said, “I was drinking it at 3pm.  She said that real Italians never drink cappuccino after 11am.  She takes Italian food and drink culture very seriously.” 

The reason that Italians only drink cappuccino in the morning is that they believe that milky coffee is bad for digestion in the afternoon.  There may be some logic to this.  But there is not enough logic to make it a strict rule, if you ask me.  Perhaps my student doesn’t have the luxury of a coffee machine that can make cappuccino in his house.  So if he wants to enjoy the drink, he has to order it whenever he finds himself in a fancy café, whatever the time. 

I can understand the reason for having a strict way of doing things in certain situations.  If you work in a nuclear power plant, say, it might be a good idea to scold people who don’t strictly follow the manual.  But coffee, really?  Isn’t how you drink it a matter of personal taste? 

The story reminded me of something my wife once told me.  When she was growing up, her mother would prepare several dishes for dinner – perhaps rice, miso soup and meat.  My wife’s mother scolded her children if they didn’t eat the several dishes little by little, switching from plate to plate.  It was not allowed to finish all of the miso soup first, for example, even if you were worried that it might go cold. 

Maybe I would have a different perspective if cappuccino were a Scottish or British drink.  Then I would feel proud of the traditional culture around drinking it.  Then I would look down on those fools who didn’t know the correct way to drink it.  I am sure that in a previous blog, for example, I laughed derisively at an American researcher who declared that the best way to enjoy a cup of tea was to add salt to it. 

I am glad I am not Italian or Japanese.  I can enjoy drinking cappuccino at 3pm without feeling guilty, and I can eat several Japanese dishes in whatever order takes my fancy.

 

In One Ear and Out the Other －片方の耳から入り、もう片方から出るー

 Yesterday my son left for school at 8 o’clock as usual. 

“Bye-bye, Daddy,” he said. 

“Bye-bye,” I said.  “Cross the road carefully.” 

I locked the door behind him. 

Twenty minutes later I started teaching an English lesson over the telephone.  As my student was talking, I could hear somebody climbing the stairs to our house.  I thought that it must be a postal delivery.  Then I heard the handle of our front door turn.  Whoever was there was trying to enter my home. 

I was only half listening to my student now, in case I had to stand up and fight off this intruder. 

In the end, I realized that it was my son coming home.  My wife let him in and I returned to my lesson.  “Has he forgotten his schoolbag or something?” I wondered. 

After the lesson was finished I found out what was going on.  Tokyo’s public schools were all closed yesterday, although it was not a public holiday generally.  My son went to his school and couldn’t understand why there was nobody else there.  Eventually he found one other student who had made the same mistake and they decided to go home. 

How did my son manage to miss the information that his school was not going to be open?  I am sure his teacher must have mentioned it.  I can just imagine my son in his class now, paying no attention at all to what his teacher was saying.  I picture him playing some game such as flicking his eraser around his desk instead of listening. 

“What did you do at school today, son?” 

“Hmmn?  Do?”

 

The Apologetic Waitress －申し訳なさそうなウェイトレスー

I recently went to a café in Tokyo with my family.  It was the first time for us to visit there, and I enjoyed some carrot cake. 

I noticed something a little bit odd about the way the waitress spoke to us.  She kept apologizing very profusely whenever she talked to us or brought us something. 

“I’m so sorry for being slow.  Here is your water.  My apologies again,” she said, even though she hadn’t been particularly slow to bring us the water. 

“Would you like that with Sauce A or with Sauce B?  I am terribly sorry, but these are the only sauces we have,” she said, even though we hadn’t expressed any dissatisfaction with the choice of sauces. 

I didn’t think much more about the waitress until she made a mistake with the order of another customer at another table. 

“Oh!” she said, “I am such a fool.  Oh, I am so sorry.  I will change it immediately.” 

She put a lot of emotion into her voice to stress how sorry she was.  Then she continued.  “The next time you come in, please scold me.  If I ever make a mistake again, please don’t hesitate to scold me.” 

The wronged customer struggled to answer this. Saying, “Uh, uh, hmmn.” 

The problem I foresee is that one day she will really make a big mistake, and it will be hard for her to make her apologies and expressions of regret any stronger.  What will she do if she spills coffee on a customer one day? 

“Oh my god.  I’ve ruined your sweater.  How can I ever be forgiven?  Pour the hot coffee on me.  I deserve it.  Just pour it all over me, I insist.”

 

Vocabulary:

To apologise profusely – to say sorry or express regret deeply or repeatedly

To scold someone – to tell someone off; to angrily or harshly point out and criticize someone for a mistake or bad behaviour

 

A Home from Home on the Train －家から離れた、電車の中の家

I don’t take the train very often any more.  I work from home, and so I don’t get to see how train etiquette is changing. 

When I did regularly take the train, it was before the age of smartphones.  So rather than spending the whole journey staring down at a phone, I generally used either to look out of the window or look at the other passengers. 

One fun oddity I occasionally got to see was the sight of a female office worker putting on her make up while she sat on a swaying seat.  It was always fun to guess whether she would be applying mascara just as the carriage lurched around a bend, and whether she would make a mess of her face. 

But I also wondered why she hadn’t just applied her make up at home, and what other elements of her morning routine she would be prepared to bring onto the train.  If the situation escalated, would I see her the next day brushing her teeth? 

According to one of my students, the situation has indeed escalated for at least one passenger on a busy train line.  My student said that on a morning commuter train, she saw an office lady who was applying hot irons to her hair.  The passengers sitting and standing around her had to be careful not to brush against the painfully hot metal. 

There used to be smoking compartments on trains.  Maybe they could be converted into “Just like home compartments”, in which busy commuters can happily pluck their eyebrows, shave, and clip their toenails?

 

Vocabulary:

(for something to) lurch – to make a sudden unsteady or uncontrolled movement, especially forwards or to the side

[eg., The cable car lurched forward when it was hit by a strong gust of wind.]