And you think English is easy. Check out the following:
We'll begin with box; the plural is boxes,
But the plural of ox is oxen, not oxes.
One fowl is a goose, and two are called geese,
Yet the plural of moose is never called meese.
You may find a lone mouse or a house full of mice,
But the plural of house is houses, not hice.
The plural of man is always men,
But the plural of pan is never pen.
If I speak of a foot, and you show me two feet,
And I five you a book, would a pair be a beek?
If one is a tooth, ad a whole se are teeth,
Why shouldn't two booths be called a beeth?
If the singular's this and the plural is these,
Should the plural of kiss be ever called Keese?
We speak of a brother and also of brethren,
But though we say mother, we never say methren.
Than the masculine pronouns are he, his and him;
But imagine the feminine...She, shis, and shim!
And how about...
The bandage was wound around the wound.
The farm who cultivated to produce the produce.
The dump was so full that the workers had to refuse more refuse.
We must polish the polish furniture at the store.
He could lead if he would get the lead out.
The soldier decided to desert his tasty dessert in the desert.
Since there is no time like the present, he thought it was time to present the present to his girlfriend.
A bass was painted on the head of the bass drum.
When shot at, the dove, dove into the bushes.
I did not object to the object which he showed me.
The insurance was invalid for the invalid in his hospital bed.
There was a row among the oarsmen to who would row.
They were too close to the door to close it.
The buck does funny things when the does (females) are present.
A seamstress and a sewer fell down into the sewer line.
To stop with planting, the farmer taught his sow to sow.
The wind was too slow to wind the sail around the mast.
Upon seeing the tear in her painting, she shed a tear.
I had to subject the subject to a series of tests.
How can I intimate this to my most intimate friend.
Anonymous
Funny but the truth is that for me English has always been hard. I told the Pathway students today of my struggles to learn English. In grade school, I used to go to special English classes at night to keep up with what I was learning in School during the day but it wasn't until I went to live in Utah and attended 6th grade that I learned English and this was before ESL. It took me six months to learn what I couldn't possible learn in six years since Kindergarten. After I had come back from attending school in Utah, I transferred to Escuela Americana where I went to school for the next six years.
in 1978, my senior year, a tragic thing happened. I fail the final English exam and the rule was that if you fail English you had to repeat the same grade over again. I did not know this at the time but I had ADD and I could never concentrate. Each time I read something my mind would wonder all the time. That class was so hard that even Shakespeare would have flunk that test if he were to take it. Ms. Marten was my teacher and she simply gave me a hug and said, "Oh dear I am so sorry, you missed two points on your final exam to reach a passing grade." That meant I would have to come back next year to repeat 12th grade and graduate a year behind, but I thought, what about if I fail English again, that would put me in the class of 1980 and so so and so forth. I was devastated and cried for days.
I went to my graduation like everybody else and participated in all the graduation events and parties without a diploma. That was the most humiliating thing that had ever happened to me in my whole life up to that point so I said good bye to Escuela Americana for good and went to an ESL program in Salt Lake by the name of "Skills Center" where all the drop out students went to get a GED. The school later became the Salt Lake Community College and when I completed the class I was accepted to start the LDS Business College the fall of 1978 so I din't miss anything. I was able to actually pass the dreaded TOEFL exam! Yippee! Passing the TOEFL exam to me was like passing the bar exam for law students. I was so happy that day knowing that I was improving my English in a way that I could be admitted to enter College in the U.S. which was the whole purpose of going to Escuela Americana in the first place.
I have continued over the years to take English classes every time I get a chance. All Pathways students are required to take a semester of English too. What a blessing to have that grand opportunity to brush up on your English. I am still learning new things in every class I take. One class I liked very much was a literature class I took where we had to read all the classic famous novels and answer essay questions about it and that is when I started to develop love for writing. Another favorite class I loved was by brother Val Johnson who had a basic English 101 but I thought it was still hard. I should take his class again and see how I do.
Over time with practice and a lot of hard work, sweat and tears my writing has gotten better. I have written a biography of my grandmother, a chapter in a book that got published two years ago, and now I am working on a book for my children that I hope to finish before the year ends.
From those humble beginnings when I took my first English class at age eleven to now, forty plus years later. I have an Associates Degree diploma in Applied Science with a major in Marketing and a Bachelor Degree diploma from Brigham Young University so I can honesty say " I have come a long way, baby!"
Con amor,
