It’s over two months into the Japanese school year. The ichinensei are still having trouble differentiating “Are you?” vs. “Is it?” and “I am.” vs “It is.”

When I ask, “Is this a pen?” They are more likely than not to respond, “Yes, I am.”

To point out their error in a way they could understand, I scrunched my face up in snarky disbelief and said “Anata wa pen desu ka?”

This, of course, caused the class to erupt in laughter. Not so much because I had asked the student if he was a pen, but because I was speaking Japanese. It causes a riot every time.

Today we were trying to address the difference between “It is.” and “I am.” once again. To soften the boredom a little, I decided I would try a joke that I just love.

“Ask me ‘Are you an apple?’” I told them.
“Are you and apple?” they dutifully responded.
“Yes. I’m an apple. Ask me ‘Are you an orange?’” I demanded.
“Are you an orange?” they droned.
“No! I’m an apple!”
….

The joke failed. Not because the English was too complex. Not because the joke relied on a pun or reference that fell outside their miniscule vocabulary. Not because the Japanese don’t have the same repetitious pattern of joke set up that causes the listener to expect a trick punch line as we have in English. Not because they couldn’t understand the humor, since they’ve never heard similar jokes within their cultural language play. No. I had worried about complex cultural differences in the format of joking causing the joke to flop, but that wasn’t it. They couldn’t think far enough for that to cause a problem. The joke frayed in the very fibers of the first coupla. They were extremely concerned and confused that I was an apple. Why? They wanted to know why I was an apple.

Not even the Japanese English Teacher got it. “Does it have something to do with New York?”

Engrish of the day:

From a bar near Ota, Gunma.