Wednesday, September 14, 2005

How not to learn a language

Yesterday I met a couple of friends for a drink, and it cheered me up. I knew it would. I had my first real belly laugh since I came back to Japan.

Friend One was talking, and happened to mention something about her Japanese teacher. Friend Two interrupted.

"I didn't know you were having lessons!" she said. "When did you start?"

Friend One waved her hand dismissively. "Oh, twenty years ago, or so," she answered. "I'm still on the same textbook."

We stared.

"My teacher can't understand a WORD I say," she said. "I'm SUCH a bad student."

When we stopped laughing, Friend Two said,

"Hasn't it occurred to you that it might be time for a change of teacher?"

"Oh, but I LIKE her," answered Friend 1. "She's my friend. She's a cool lady."

"I bet she teaches you in English," I said, giggling.

"Well, yes..."

"And I bet her English has REALLY improved after all these years!"

We hooted.

"Well... yes..."

"And YOU pay HER? How much do you pay her?" asked Friend Two.

"Oh, not much," said Friend One, somewhat defensively. "It's hardly anything."

I think it's sweet that she has remained loyal to her teacher for all these years.

On the other hand, I wonder how much of her trouble with Japanese would not exist if she had switched to another teacher, say, oh, nineteen and a half years ago?

4 comments:

melinama said...

I've seen these collusive teacher-student relationships! Look closely - everybody is getting what they want.

Doris said...

Very funny situation, though I reckon I would have stopped charging many years ago let alone pretended there was actually some teaching going on.

And, I bet that same text book is now well out of date!

BTW - Welcome back :-)

kenju said...

Isn't that funny! Too bad she didn't notice that a long time ago, but as you say, she is getting a friendship out of it. Too bad she has ahd to pay for it all these years!

tinyhands said...

Isn't that the way the Japanese teach English as well, in Japanese?