I Have a Bad Case of Diarrhea

After my posting two days ago, I got a bit curious about that peculiar English learning method. It turned out to be a well known television series in Japan. Its official name is Eikaiwa Taisō Zuiikin' English, or short for Zuiikin English, which means English conversation and gymnastic exercise.

The mastermind of this TV program is a genius; who would have thought to link these two things together! And not just a genius, but a philosophical, creative genius, according to this Wikipedia entry:

"Fernandez Verde, demonstrates an interesting philosophy in learning languages. He proclaims that different cultures use muscles in different proportions due to their customs. For example, in one episode he states Japanese people have stronger lower back muscles (from bowing and keeping a lower posture), and a different leg muscle structure (due to squatting for long periods of time). He feels that using those particular muscles while learning the language of that culture will create strong connotations in your mind and faster learning."

Still, after watching one more episode of Zuiikin English, I truly feel I have a bad case of Diarrhea.

Spare Me My Life

I always thought that the best way to learn English is to watch a drama film. The good drama is better than the best ESL teacher; the plot draws you in, the visual makes scenes vivid, and the dialogue keeps you engaged. Even you don't completely understand it, you are bound to learn a lot more by sitting in a dark theater for two hours than in a bright classroom for a whole day.

Until I watched this video clip, I never thought that a bad drama could have done even a better job:



Well, whoever directed this drama, he's mastered one technique that's often seen in a great drama: swift and drastic scene transition to achieve maximum emotional impact.

Even if I were desperate to learn English, sparing three cheerleaders' lives to do it is just too much for me.

Talk About How They Learned English

Talk of the Nation, a regular talk show at National Public Radio (NPR), brought in Tom Miller, the editor of How I Learned English, to talk about the book. Two of the Latinos featured in the book also came on air to share their experiences. One of them had Frank Sinatra to thank for his master of English language. Several non-native speakers with various backgrounds called in and talked about their personal stories.

Each one of them speaks almost a perfect English. But as far as I can tell, no one has mentioned a word of textbook. Or classroom.

Listen to the whole interview here.

Book: How I Learned English

A new book came out recently titled How I Learned English. I was hoping the author were Arnold Schwarzenegger. Or George W. Bush. But its subtitle tells that more than one has a story to tell, and they all have one thing in common--55 Accomplished Latinos Recall Lessons in Language and Life.

It got me really interested. I've always been curious about how others learned their English. This is the editorial review from Publishers Weekly:

"Veteran travel writer Miller (On the Border) has put together a substantial volume on language, knowledge and cultural assimilation, gathering essays and excerpts from more than 50 authors, poets, professional athletes and musicians, doctors and politicians who took up English as a second (or third, or fourth) language. As PBS correspondent Ray Suarez notes in the foreword, for many "the need to learn English was accompanied by wrenching personal circumstances: exile, illness, economic migration, family dissolution," but it was also "a proffered ticket to... the modern and changing world." In a piece from 1982's Hunger of Memory, for example, Richard Rodriguez recalls distinctions he made as a child between a private and a public language-Spanish had always been his to use, but English, what he needed for school, felt more difficult to embrace. In a selection from her 2001 memoir American Chica, Washington Post books editor Marie Arana tells how she feigned ignorance of English on her first day at a new elementary school so she'd be funneled into the Spanish-speaking class. Other contributors such as Alvaro Vargas Llosa, Walter Mercado, Enrique Fernández and Daisy Zamora provide nuanced perspectives on the ongoing immigration debate, putting faces to the statistics and concrete meaning to broad points of policy and ideology."

Los Angeles Times also had a review about the book by a Cornell University professor. Here is an excerpt from her review:

"The result is a wide range of remembered English lessons, some of which are comical: Poet José Kozer advises that instead of using "beach" (which sounds too much like "bitch"), "I would say 'shore.' " Others offer practical advice, such as to carry a pocket dictionary, or to ask "older people who [don't] seem in a hurry" for directions. Some can be heartbreaking, as in the case of physician and poet Rafael Campo, who felt he had to "unlearn" Spanish to "finally leave Cuba behind and become truly American.""

I can't wait to read it.

English Crash Course

No one has yet figured out exactly how our brain works when we learn a new language. But it's safe to say it takes a lot of efforts and time; a few months for those who are talented in language, and maybe years for those who are much better working with numbers. There is no shortcut even if you are in a hurry.

Until your head is smashed, luckily.

According to this report, this was what happened to a Czech speedway racer after a rider ran over his head in an accident:

"Non-English speaker Matej Kus, 18, took the spill during a race in the UK. Paramedics were stunned when he came round and asked where he was – in perfect English. It soon became apparent that Kus had lost his memory, forgetting he was a Czech bike racer, and presumably thinking he was an accent coach at the BBC."

I was about to take a crash course myself, and wonder what language I would end up with after I come round--it didn't occur to me that I might not. Then one more glance at the story stopped me cold. It says:

"The biker's foray into the world of received pronunciation was shortlived, however. As soon as his memory returned, two days later, his command of English evaporated."

Wow, isn't our brain something?

TV Commercials: Wanna Learn English?

Learning English is a huge business. No surprises a few TV commercials were made to promote it. Here are three samples.

This one was aired in Germany:


German is quite good at humor after all.

This one was aired in Japan:


Let's just say it's a low budget commercial. And it's lost in translation.

This one was aired in Netherlands:


Well, it was aired first, then banned.

I guess that vulgar language is no longer covered in the Soesman's lesson plan any more.

Flying in Blind

If you are about to take an international flight, and you are usually jitter about flying, then what you want to know about the captain of your flight that may calm you down a notch or two?

The pilot is well-trained in flying? He's very experienced to handle the emergency?

All right, those are in my mind too. A positive answer to either can make me feel better. It helps further if he's able to tell a few good jokes. Laugh, after in-flight red wine, is always able to sooth my nerve.

Then I watched this CNN report about the Air China Flight 981, flying from Beijing to New York's JFK International Airport:


(for the complete exchanges between the pilot and the controller, see this YouTube clip)

Okay, forget about telling jokes. And I don't even care if the captain were flying space shuttles before retiring to become a commercial pilot. From now on, I'd just pray like a hell that the captain of whatever flight I'll be on can speak damn English. Or at least understand it.

In case that isn't answered, then pray harder for the controller on the ground; better is he bilingual. Well, make it multilingual, just to play safe.

Is that clear?

That is NOT a question.

Wag the Dog

Even a Dog Can Teach You English. Not just any dog; it's the world's most famous beagle, Snoopy, of the comic strip Peanuts.

Nintendo has recent released a DS game called English Lessons With Snoopy in Japan. Using the touch screen, it teaches kids English words and phrases, with the help of Snoopy and the rest of Peanuts gang: Charlie Brown, Linus, and Lucy.

I don't play the game. But I know Peanuts a lot. Hey, why play the stupid game to learn words and phrases piece by piece, while simply letting kids watch the Peanuts cartoon or read the comic strips would do a much better job. For one, it's a lot more fun; and kids can pick up the language in whole with the context, often masterfully written and lovingly narrated by Charlie Brown.

It's not Snoopy's fault, though. He is too smart to wag the dog.

It Takes a Village

Hillary Clinton wrote a book called It Takes a Village, subtitled And Other Lessons Children Teach Us. That was over ten years ago, while she was the first lady. Given the star stature of Hillary, the book generated tons of publicity and interest then.

Someone in Taiwan might have taken it literately, according to the following BBC News report:

"Every day, 120 students travel by school bus to the Happy English Village in Taoyuan county - about an hour from the capital, Taipei, for English immersion classes.

The "village" is actually attached to one of the county's elementary schools.

Ordinary classrooms have been transformed to look like an airport waiting room and customs area - complete with the fuselage of a real plane donated by a Taiwanese airline company.

There are other themed rooms including a hotel; a bank; a pharmacy, general store; restaurant and coffee bar; science and cookery rooms and a dance studio."

Okay, it's not exactly what Hillary envisioned. At least, the subtitle has to be changed to And We Teach Children Other English Lessons.

It's spoken English lessons, by the way.

"At the Happy English Village in Taoyuan, foreign volunteer teachers interact with groups of 12 children in each class. The emphasis is on speaking. There are no lectures or written tests."

Taiwan isn't even the first country that stole Hillary's plan. South Korea has done it in several locations, so have Spain and Italy.

Sounds like a neat idea. Will it fly?

These two kids, going through a mock airport onto a 'plane' at the village, were apparently saying: "Oh, Yeah."

9/11 Anniversary: Tears In Heaven

March 20, 1991 was a tragic and painful day for one particular individual, guitarist and singer Eric Clapton.

At 11:00am in New York City, a small boy fell from a window of the 53rd floor in a high-rise apartment building. In a few seconds, gone was the young life, completely unexpected.

The boy was Clapton's four-year old son, Conor. In the following months, Clapton wrote one of the greatest songs of all time, Tears In Heaven, and performed many times on stage. The melody was sad and blue; the lyrics was personal and touching.

Writing and singing the song helped Clapton heal the wound and recover from the tragedy. Listening to the song, I felt deeply sorry for him. But I couldn't say I had really felt his pain.

Then came another tragic day, September 11, 2001.

Within a short few hours, 2974 lives were falling, totally unexpected. It was so surreal that I had stayed numbed in front of a TV set for hours. Only afterward did the pain and grief begin to sink in.

Then from nowhere, the melody of Tears in Heaven started to fill my ears. At that moment, I understood and felt Clapton's pain. On that day, millions of Americans had felt what Clapton did ten years before.

I've listened to Tears in Heaven many times since. Clapton wrote that song to heal himself; he probably doesn't know that it has also healed millions of others.

At the sixth anniversary of 9/11, I turned to Tears in Heaven one more time.

The Best Movie Scenes For Voice-Over

In practicing English by doing voice-over, you have endless Hollywood movie scenes to choose from. Here are the top five scenes that I've never gotten tired of doing:

1. Scent of a Woman

His eyes are blind, but his words are electrifying. This is Al Pacino's best performance.


2. Dead Poets Society

He stands tall, and he delivers the best inspiring speeches that a teacher can ever give; Robin Williams, when not making us laugh in a comedy, makes us cry in a drama like this.


3. Before Sunrise

He talks fast, and he's nervous; she listens closely, and she's curious. Ethan Hawke looks innocent in his appearance, but radiates charm in his words.


4. Patton

He's foul-mouthed, and he talks tough. George Scott's voice maybe hoarse, but his words are piercing with a ringing truth.


5. Wall Street

He's sharp, and he's audacious. Michael Douglas delivers the sleekest speech ever while still keeping his mega-ego in check.

Voice-Over with Hollywood Movies

To speak like a native speaker, you need to act it out like one as often as you can, before it starts to sound naturally to you.

Acting? All right, you don't have to be on stage in school performing Shakespeare classics and pretending you are Romeo or Julia; just rent your favorite Hollywood movie, turn on the English subtitle, and do the voice-over as if you were Tom Hanks, or Meryl Streep, or whoever do the talking on the scene.

Watch how this Japanese did it with On Any Given Sunday:

(Here is the original. Gosh, how I admire and love Al Pacino's signature rhetoric! )

This guy also did voice-over with The Matrix and Independence Day. Sure, he needs to work on his accent harder. And the trace of an accent may stay with him no matter how hard he tries. But as long as he does it long enough, he will speak English with a natural rhythm and tone as a native speaker.

I wish I had done it much earlier. I had an easy excuse, though: in the late 80s, VCR in the Chinese households was as rare as panda in the wild.

On top of it, the authority did a much better job to protect original Hollywood movies from falling to our hands than to protect pandas from falling to the hunter's traps.

Joey Speaks French. Or Not.

I had a good laugh watching Joey to learn French at this Friend episode:

He's born with one trait that most language learners would die to have: completely lack of shyness and feel for embarrassment. This should be his biggest advantage. But, as Phoebe madly found out, Joey's ears tune out anything that's not familiar to him. It's balanced out his advantage. He ended up like a moron.

For someone who is born with a pair of ears that's completely insensitive to the tune and rhythm, learning a new language could be a painful struggle.

No Kidding, No Degree

The year I went to college in China, the Education Ministry raised the bar of the English proficiency level that every college student needed to cross by the time of graduation, regardless one's major. It went nut with a standard test and mandated the national Certificate English Test (CET) test, starting from Level One to the highest Level six. Either you passed the Level 4, or you kissed off the diploma.

By all means, CET was a serious test. It included all the standard areas of a language acquisition: listening comprehension, vocabulary, reading, and writing. Whoever designed the test, they made sure one criteria being met: squeeze out every bit of fun in language learning. On the receiving end, many students felt it's pain in the ass to prepare for and to take the test. My pain was felt well beyond the ass.

I knew it wasn't purely my fault, but I dared not challenge the authority either. Only reading a piece of news today did I come to a sudden realization: that I was at the wrong place at the wrong time. According to this report on Taiwan's new education policy:

"In a decree on August 28, the education ministry suggested that vocational schools and technical colleges should revise their curriculum to improve the standard of the students, the United Daily News (UDN) reported on Tuesday.

Regarding English, the ministry suggested that each student must be able to sing at least eight English songs and tell eight jokes as part of the graduation exam. Those who fail cannot graduate."

No kidding!

Follow Me in YouTube

I blogged about Follow Me, an English educational TV program produced by BBC, about a year ago. To the millions of Chinese, Follow Me wasn't just an educational program; it was our first peek of a colorful, unbelievable contemporary world, contrasting so drastically different from the dull, somewhat depressing one that we were living then.

When I was writing the piece, several main characters in the program came back to my memory with the vividly images. I knew that memory would stay with me for many years to come, if not forever.

Well, those characters no longer just dwell in my memory; thanks to YouTube, they are now right in front of my eyes and, with just a few clicks away.

Delightedly, I found two Follow Me clips on YouTube. The first one is the promo:



Gosh, my memory didn't fail me. Both Francis and Jane came out almost exactly as them of I recalled.

The second one is one episode about travel:


The obese husband is still as funny as I watched the first time.