This morning, I tested the new Japanese group that I’m going to have for my last couple of weeks here at the summer school. After I’d collected the papers, I asked one student:
Me: How was the test?
Him: Blank (but smiley) face
Me: Easy? Hard?
Him: Yes!
Thinking to myself, ‘well, there’s always one, isn’t there?’, I decided not to get discouraged and instead, tried to engage another student in conversation.
Me: Are you tired?
Him: Yes.
Me: (I should have quit while I was ahead) What time did you arrive yesterday?
Him: Dangerous. (Puts head in hands) VERY dangerous.
Me: Mmm hmm. Gotcha.
I have a feeling it’s going to be a long couple of weeks.
Expat Eye on Latvia 
Thanks for visiting my blog. I think yours is fun.
Thanks! I really enjoy your series with Marie Ann!
Well thank you. I will look forward to more of your posts
Good luck and I wish you truckloads of patience 🙂
My last nerve is pretty strained at the moment!
Ha 😀 I had the same conversation pattern with few people from Thailand 🙂 The guy always wanted to eat “yes”.. Good luck with the group 🙂
I’ve had the fish and lice conversation a few times! Might write a post about it – funny stuff! 🙂
Are you trying to piss off the nation of Japan now, too?
Ha ha, no! I really like them!
haha! brilliant! rather you than me 😛 good luck! 🙂
Thanks! 🙂
Good luck, Linda! But at least they are smiling; that is, they are not hostile … yet. Well, I can’t imagine them being hostile with you 🙂 And the one bloke might have been trying to tell you that he had a VERY dangerous arrival, never mind the time 🙂
Thank you for trying to find some sense in it! They’re really sweet actually. Every time you correct something, they say ‘sorry, sorry, thank you, thank you’ like you’ve just done them the biggest favour in the world! Telling the time today – seems apt. And a bit of ‘What’s the time Mr Wolf?’ – weather allowing!
At least your attempts at conversation with them should give you plenty of blogging material 😉
Maybe I’ll start ‘Despairing Eye on the Japanese’ 😉
I’ve had the reverse, where that was me in Japanese class >_< I had it all 4 years of high school, and I still can't string together a sentence in the language! I just feel like English is so insanely different, especially the grammatical structure. Ahhhhh!
I certainly don’t envy you! I think at this stage, any language that has a different alphabet is beyond me!
At least they seem to do a range of facial expressions including the smiling thing… there is still hope…
Yup, blank and smiley for the next two weeks! Exciting stuff!
You will have a lot of very surprising coversations :-). Sounds very challenging. Maybe you try to speak Japanese?
I think they’ll learn English faster!