Don’t let your mouth run away with you －調子に乗って、しゃべりすぎるな－

When we first got together, she promised, “I will give everything I have and do everything I can to bring you an exciting and successful relationship.”

But she left me after two and a half years.

When we first lay in bed, she said, “I have loved you all my life and to be given this fantastic opportunity and to be with such a truly great man is a dream come true.”

But now she lies with another.

Someone from her hometown said, “I grew up with her.  She is known around here as ‘Mochi’.  We used to play with her in the car park or behind the school.  I was in her class at secondary school and when the teacher asked what she wanted to do when she grew up, she just said that she wanted to marry William.”

And yet she has just remarried.  At the wedding she said that she would give everything, give her life, for her new husband.

A short time after we got together, when I was worried by her flirtation with another man, she complained, “It just shows you how distrustful the world is now – the gossip and speculation that goes on.  I’ve just landed my dream man – the man I’ve loved all my life.”

Yet now her friends say that she was never happy in our relationship.  How could she have been when I didn’t buy her all the things she wanted?

When some people speculated that she might be happier with another man, she said, “There is not a place I could be in this world right now where I’d be happier in my married life and personal life.”

When I think back now, there were a few hints that she wouldn’t stay forever.  Six months into our relationship, when everything was going well, she said, “For me, whatever I do with the rest of my life, to marry William is the ultimate.  I’m hopefully going to be attractive for the next 15 to 20 years but to have married William and been with him is an incredible honour.”

And, “I don’t see William as a stepping stone.  I want to be here as long as I can.”

During the marriage, a journalist said, “William is lucky to have this girl as wife.  She gives the marriage purpose, belief, conviction.”

*

Be careful what you say.  Don’t let your mouth run away with you.  If you make promises you cannot keep then your words will later seem hollow and people will feel betrayed.

The quotes above are mostly real, but I changed them slightly – from football management to marriage.  I am a big fan of Celtic, a Scottish football club.  Our manager has just left us suddenly in the middle of a season to double his wages by managing an English club, Leicester.

The manager was very successful and would have been remembered as a hero if he had waited until the end of the season to leave. What is even worse about his betrayal is the number of times he said that Celtic was the club he had loved all his life, how he couldn’t be happier anywhere else, and so on.

Be careful what you say.  Don’t let your mouth run away with you.  If you make promises you cannot keep then your words will later seem hollow and people will feel betrayed.

Vocabulary:

to get together – of a relationship, to form a partnership; to start to date

flirtation – behaviour that demonstrates a playful sexual attraction toward someone

the ultimate – the best or final

a stepping stone – one stage on a path leading somewhere else

hollow – without substance

to betray – to be seriously disloyal to; to cheat someone’s trust 

A most unfortunate allergy －とても残念なアレルギー－

Allergies can be deadly serious.  Or they can be annoying, ridiculous, and even a little funny.  Here are three stories of the latter kind.

I have a friend who has a wheat allergy.  This must be annoying because she can’t eat most bread or drink most beer.  She used to live on a small Japanese island and, as a rare foreign resident, was well-treated by the locals.  Before she realised that she had an allergy, the local baker used to give her free bread.  When my friend found out that she had a wheat allergy, she didn’t want to hurt the baker’s feelings by refusing the bread.  She couldn’t eat it, and she didn’t want to throw it out at the garbage collection point in case it was seen.  So she accepted the free bread every week for months, and carefully buried it in her garden.

My wife has an egg allergy.  This must be annoying because so many different types of food contain egg.  She can’t eat most sweets or cakes.  Even surprising sweets like rice-cakes sometimes contain egg, since it can be added to the outside to make the food look shiny.  I enjoy pretending that all chocolates and luxury foods I receive as gifts have egg in them.

“Can I try one of those truffles?” she asks, tentatively.

I stuff the last two into my mouth.  “No.  They tasted of egg.  I’m only trying to protect you, darling”

But I have come to realise that the allergies of my wife and my friend are not so bad after all.  I have developed an even more unfortunate allergy.  I seem to have developed an allergy to young, pretty women.

Most of my students are women.  In recent months I have noticed that I often cannot stop sneezing during the lessons.  This only happens with female students, and especially the younger ones.

It could be that my nose has become very sensitive, and that I sneeze whenever I am in a room with someone who is wearing perfume.  This tends to be worn by young or middle-aged women, rather than elderly women.  Or maybe I really am allergic to young, pretty women.  In any case, you can see what a curse this allergy is!

Ps.  Please do not feel offended if I sneeze during our lesson.  Even more so, please do not feel offended if I don’t sneeze during our lesson.

Vocabulary:

latter - the second thing, when two things have been mentioned; not the former

to hurt someone’s feelings – to make someone feel bad or offended

to bury something – to put something under the grtentatively -  - in a way that lacks confidence; hesitantly

to stuff something somewhere – to put something somewhere roughly or carelessly

to sneeze – to suddenly eject air from your nose and mouth in an involuntary physical reaction

Peace and blame －平和と非難－

The ten year-old girl came stalking over to me and pointed.  Her eyes were hot with anger.  “Your country did this to us!”  Her voice was shaking with emotion.  She waited for me to accept the blame and apologise.

We were at the Maruki Gallery in Saitama, where you can see the collected works of Iri Maruki, who was born in Hiroshima and survived the atomic bombing.  He painted many works about the suffering of the victims, as well as other paintings depicting the victims of the Japanese invasion of Asia and the victims of war in many countries around the world.

The children were on a school excursion, and I had been invited to accompany them.  The gallery was divided into two floors, with the paintings about Hiroshima on one floor, and the paintings about other victims on the other floor.  I was just an assistant language teacher and so did not have any specific responsibility for looking after a group of children.  I was able to walk around freely and I saw both parts of the gallery.

I got the impression that the artist had a strong sense of the horrible suffering caused by war and his view that in war all countries were capable of committing acts of evil.  He wanted people to understand the suffering of the victims of the atomic bombing not because they were Japanese, but because they were people.

The children did not have the chance to walk around freely, and they were only shown the paintings about Hiroshima.  They then sat and listened to a lecture about the sufferings of the Japanese.  Without seeing the other floor and only seeing victims and stories from one country, the children came away with the impression that the only, or main, victims of the war were Japanese.  And at least one girl was made so angry that she confronted me about it and expected me to apologise.

I told her that I wasn’t American, that I wasn’t born during the war, that my father wasn’t even born during the war, that Japanese soldiers had killed people too, and that maybe she had missed the point of the art exhibition.  But I didn’t say any more in case the school got angry at me for interfering with their educational policy.

I’d like to think that the girl is now old enough to have a wider view of both war and life.  Or perhaps she spends her evenings posting angry messages on Twitter.  In any case, I read a book about victims of another war in another country and remembered going to the gallery.  It is well worth visiting if you have the chance.  The pictures will stay in the back of your mind for many years afterwards.

Vocabulary:

to stalk – to walk forcefully in a proud, stiff or angry manner

to depict – to represent by a drawing, painting or other art form

an excursion – a short trip or tour, especially one for leisure

to interfere with  - to get involved without invitation or necessity

A little sunshine in a spotted mind －欠点のある精神に少しの日差し－

I sometimes wish I could lose some of my negative memories.  My memories are not any more negative than most people’s, but they seem to get stuck in my mind.  If I have been slightly embarrassed or hurt, the memory sticks in my mind and jumps out at me for weeks, or sometimes even years.  I remember slightly misusing a word when I was in high-school, and one of my friends laughing at me for making the mistake.  It is still a little painful to remember the scene and the embarrassment I felt, even though I know it was an extremely minor incident.  In the future, could a doctor cut out the painful memory?  If he did, would I still be the same person?

You don’t often hear people bemoaning the state of their mind, and wishing they had a different one: “I’m so neurotic.  I’m thinking of having a little surgery done on my brain – You know, a little off the frontal lobe.” Or, “I’m such a horrible racist.  What I would give for a better mind!”

People don’t have these thoughts, probably because they seem illogical.  If a mind wishes to be a different mind, then it is wishing for self-destruction.

But people frequently do wish for a different body, or improvements to various body parts: “I’ll just have a little surgery on my nose.”  Or, “What I would give to have been born with straight hair!”

Is the different attitude we take to body and mind justifiable?  When I have finished inventing my memory erasing machine, would you have certain memories erased?  Maybe I have already invented it, but have forgotten.  Maybe I have already used it on you, but you have forgotten.  Do you want those deleted memories back?

Vocabulary:

neurotic – mentally ill

the frontal lobe (of the brain) – one part of the brain

“What I would give...” – I would give a lot...; I really wish...

Illogical – lacking sense or clear, sound reasoning

self-destruction – the action of causing so much harm to yourself that you die or no longer exist

justifiable – able to be shown to be right or reasonable