WWIII started by the English!

The English language that is. I am the first to admit that my English is not perfect. Have you noticed my punctuation issues?Even though English is my first and basically only language, I have been known to make a mistake or two. Nothing serious, but it has happened. For my husband, English is a second language and his English is impeccable. Excluding one unfortunate hyphen/hymen mix-up while giving an address, I can honestly say that I have never heard him make a mistake in English. For that reason, I often pick his brain concerning pressing English language issues that I may have. Yes, our marriage is just that exciting.

What does the proper use of the English language mean for me? Well, most importantly, it means that I have a job. It is my job to help people develop their language skills and to my students I always say - “Your success is my success” – your failure, however, is all your own ;) But those are people for whom the English language is a second language if not a third or fourth. I do a little of teaching, correcting, encouraging and sometimes even disciplining. Even in a conversation lesson, I am constantly “on” listening for mistakes and supplying the missing word or sentence structure. If I were not a teacher, I probably would not even pay attention to subject-verb agreement or double negatives, but as I teach, watch TV or read, I can’t turn off my English teacher ears.

If you are an English teacher and you’d like to pain your teacher ears, I invite you for a viewing of the Jerry Springer Show. While I am not a Jerry Springer fan, I have watched it a few times and am truly embarrassed that it is broadcast in Poland. It is like airing your country’s dirty laundry for all the other countries to see. It has been said that the guests are not genuine, that either they are paid actors or that they tried to get on the show for fun. I disagree because in actuality people’s stupidity knows no bounds and also because I can hear when they speak that they are sincere no matter how crazy the topic is. However, there was one case that I was pretty sure was a fake. I don’t remember the topic exactly but it involved a secret (don’t they all?) in which a young lady had to reveal to her partner that she was in fact a stripper. I became suspicious first by the over-the-top reaction of the partner, but then by the lady’s proper use of the 3rd conditional. Not that strippers cannot have good grammar, but her appropriate use seemed somehow incongruous with her life story. To be fair, even Wolf Blitzer of CNN made a mistake in the 2nd conditional last week (I know, I need a hobby).

If you are rusty on your grammar…

2nd conditional: If I were you, I would not do that.

3rd conditional: If you had not stolen that car, you would not have been in prison. (you are out of prison-the crime and the prison stay are both in the past)

2nd/3rd mixed: If you had not stolen that car, you would not be in prison. (you are still in prison)

There is a language bone of contention in our house. It concerns the use of present continuous over present simple. Present simple should be used for (among other things) permanent states while present continuous is used for temporary states. So, if you haven’t seen me for a long time, let’s say, since high school and you ask what I’m up to, I will say “I’m living in Poland”. And from that one innocent sentence, WWIII breaks out in our house. Why? Because in that one sentence, I have shared with you my deepest feelings about my life in Poland. I have let you know that I see my stay in Poland as temporary. I do not answer, “I live in Poland” which suggests a permanency, but rather “I’m living in Poland” as if I’ve got one foot out the door already. But the rest of my actions don’t say that. I’m married to a Polish man. We have 2 kids together. We have a business together. We bought an apartment and house together with the joint mortgage debt that comes with them. I say that actions speak louder than words, but Misiu says that my words say what I really think.

Who’s right?

The Lottery

I need to win the lottery and I’ve even bought a ticket. Maybe we’ll win. Somebody’s got to. If my posts take a sharp turn in the direction of exotic vacation destinations or how to wallpaper a room in 200 złoty bank notes, then you’ll know that we’ve won.

I mentioned before that I like to ask my students what they would do with a million dollars. It’s not just my sick curiosity. It is a good way to practice the 2nd conditional. Travel around the world is the answer given by most. Actually it goes like this, “If I had a million dollars, I would travel around the world.” I make my students answer using the complete structure. If I had a million dollars, I too would like to travel around the world, but that is something which requires a bit of planning. I started to think about what I would do immediately, today, if somebody handed me a million dollars. Misiu has reminded me that a million dollars isn’t what it used to be, but I need a nice sum to use as an example and come on, someone handing me 10 million dollars is just plain ridiculous.

The first thing I would do is buy new socks. Actually, I think I would buy 365 pairs of new socks. I’m serious. I have a real sock crisis going on. I have only 3 socks (not 3 pairs) that do not have a current or recently mended hole in them. That’s a pretty serious problem because usually when you visit someone in Poland you take off your shoes at the door. I have to strategically plan my sock-wearing to make sure I have a hole-free pair for public viewing.

Next, I would hit the kids book section at empik (it’s a large book store chain also with music, films and games) and the toy store where I would buy Lizzie the bike we keep visiting that she wants.

For Misiu, I would buy an entire new wardrobe. I mean I would like a new wardrobe for myself too, but that would require more time and some serious help of a stylist ‘cause I don’t have any fashion sense at all. Have you heard about my socks? For Misiu, clothes are something you need to keep yourself from being naked. He hates shopping for himself and the last time he bought anything was when we were in the US about 5 years ago. In case you are wondering how long it takes to wear out your clothes, it is about the 5 year mark. Misiu has holes on holes and is starting to look like a scarecrow excluding one very nice Gap jacket that he just started to wear last season after discovering it in the back of the wardrobe with the price tag from America still on it. “I thought it was yours,” he said. Yes, ‘cause everyone knows at the Gap I wear XXL.

Next, I would buy Misiu a monocle. I imagine that every rich guy has one. Then I would drop him off at Biedronka (OK, we don’t live in an exclusive neighborhood, so he could just walk there…or to Żabka. We’ve got 3 of them.) where he could inspect the ingredients list and prices of their grocery items and ask loudly, “Excuse me, please. How much does this block of lard cost? I absolutely must have it.”

I also got to wondering what it feels like for people who have that level of wealth or success? Now that I have children, I think about wealth in a different way. I used to think that it would be cool to travel somewhere or to buy something. Now I think how fantastic it would be to secure my children financially, to afford a top-notch education for them and, of course, to spoil them a little bit. It would be great if my wealth were a direct result of my hard work and achievement. Having said that, if someone handed me a million, I’d take it for sure. I’d also like to show my parents that I can take care of myself and my family because I know that they worry about us, and I’d like to put them at ease. Not that I’m all deep like that. I’d also like to show off a bit to some people from my past who were less than supportive of me. Do wealthy people once they are wealthy lose that desire to rub it in? I have to find a wealthy person and ask them. It’s like when Agnieszka Chylinska, Polish rock vocalist, accepting her Fryderyk music award at the beginning of her career gave a big “fuck off” to the teachers who said she would never make it in the music industry, but in later years when receiving an award said “nie będzie żadnych fucków” ("there won’t be any 'fucks'") in her acceptance speech. Did she lose the desire to rub it in? I will have to ask her because we run in the same circles. I wish.

I would also like to have a Pretty Woman moment. You know, being snubbed in an exclusive shop for looking too poor to shop there and then coming back to show off your shopping. There’s a simple explanation as to why that has never happened to me. I am too poor to shop in exclusive shops. Once I was told by the shop assistant at Coccodrillo (It’s a kids clothing store and not considered exclusive.) that I couldn’t come in with my shopping cart. It was one of those car ones and I had Lizzie in the “car” part and Rosie in the shopping cart seat part and a lot of shopping in the cart part. I explained that my shopping cart is not any bigger than our baby carriage that we usually come shopping with and that I can’t very well park my family outside. “Sorry, store policy,” she explains. “But it is a weekday morning, the shop is large and there are not any other shoppers in sight,” I reply. Unfazed, she answers, “ No. Store policy.” If I had had the time and more importantly the money, I would have spent a bundle at Reserved Kids and come back shaking my bags saying “Big mistake. Huge.” just like Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman sans the big hat and Richard Gere. (Notice my use of the 3rd conditional above.)

All joking aside, this is what I would really do. First, I would pay off all my debts and then check if I had any money left ;) If I had some left, I would arrange to install central heating in my house. I know, dream big. After that, I would book flights to America so that I could visit my family and introduce them to my children. (Before that I would have to get my children some US passports, but that part just takes all the fun out of my plan.) Next, I would get pregnant. I absolutely would and would continue to do so until the money or my womb gave way, whichever came first. If I were rich, I just might turn into the next reality TV mom with tons of kids and super pouty lips. Who could resist a huge bi-lingual family with a monocle-wearing Dad and a new-pair-of-socks-every-day-wearing Mom? Don’t laugh. You know that you’d tune in.

Awkward moments

Here is just the first installment of awkward moments I have had with my students. There will be more to come.

Who are my students? Mostly, they are business people who would like to learn English for work. If they are lucky enough, they have lessons at the office, during work hours, paid by their company. Most often they already know some English but from time to time I get a student who is just starting out. I teach factory workers, accountants, doctors, company presidents, politicians, lawyers, other teachers, university students and even some children. Some of my students take lessons just for fun, some focus on business English and others are preparing for exams such as CAE. I also have a small group of students who have lessons because their friends have lessons with me and they want to have bragging rights too. For whatever reasons my students have lessons, I am happy to teach them awkward moments and all.

**Please note that the ranking does not represent level of actual awkwardness. It represents nothing other than what popped into my head first.**

Awkward moment #1 When I go to a company for a first lesson, it is easy to place my student in the hierarchy of the company. I see the position on the door, the size of the office, the number of hot secretaries, the obligatory leather furniture, the framed picture with Bill Gates (Did somebody say, “Next, please”?) and any other office status symbols. When I meet on neutral ground for a first lesson, I often get some information like this from my boss Misiu, Przezes Zarządu (CEO) of our language school: “You gotta meet with Jurek from the bank. 9 am Saturday. Don’t be late.” And so I met with Jurek from the bank on a Saturday morning 9:00 sharp. I was wearing jeans and a blouse. Jurek was also wearing jeans and a t-shirt that had seen better days. Think the t-shirt you paint your house in after you’ve painted your house.

With coffee, notebooks and pens ready, the first-lesson tango begins.

“Where are you from?” he asks. “From Pennsylvania,” I answer.

“Why do you want to learn English?” I ask. “For work,” he answers.

“Why did you decide to come Poland?” he asks. “Long story,” I say.

“How long have you been learning English?” I enquire. “For 15 years, on and off,” he states.

“Mówisz po polsku (Do you speak Polish)?” he jokes. “Trochę (a little),” I laugh.

“What do you do at the bank?” I ask.

The music stops and our tango screeches to a halt.

“Hmm, umm, well I, ah, I work there,” he says.

“Ok, but you have a job title, I suppose. What is it? Knowing what you do will help me prepare our lessons,” I explain.

“Well, I do so many things that my job title is unimportant,” he defends.

“I understand that, but it must say something on your business card,” I pry.

“Well, it does but it doesn’t really matter because it is my brother’s bank. I basically help my brother,” he explains.

Reverting to Valley Girl, I ask, “ So like what, like your brother, like owns the bank?”

“Yes,” he replies.

Thank goodness I had not led out with my Exercise on the 2nd Conditional entitled, What would you do if you had a million dollars?

Awkward moment #2

After many lessons with questions such as the million dollar one from above, I can predict what my students are going to say and what mistakes they are going to make. That’s my job. However, you should not ask a question assuming you know the answer and you should never ask a question you do not really want the answer to. I learned that lesson well when I was starting out teaching. (BTW, top answer by Polish people to the million dollar question is to travel around the world.)

I had what I thought was a brilliant worksheet practicing the difference between “Have you ever done this?” and “Would you ever do that?” Most of the questions were pretty tame like “Have you ever eaten sushi?” or “ Would you ever jump out of an airplane?” For one particular student I decided to spice up the questions a bit. With the mildly spicy question “Have you ever driven drunk?” I got to know that my definition of drunk driving (drinking alcohol and then driving) is different than my student’s definition (drinking alcohol, driving, getting caught by the police). The question “Have you ever stolen anything?” required a Bill Clinton definition of what exactly “ to steal” means. In the eyes of my student, poorly-secured items could not be classified under “stolen” and if you acquired them while abroad, whether the items were secured or not ceased to be an issue. While strange, those moments were not awkward. Here comes the awkward.

First, I must explain that this student had a peculiar habit of closing his eyes for extended periods of time while speaking. He would begin to speak and take a 20-second or longer blink. It was very unnerving when we started our lessons together. Later, I learned to take advantage of my 20 seconds of invisibility to yawn, glance at the clock or scratch my nose. After learning that my student had in fact eaten sushi, been bungee-jumping and climbed Kilimanjaro, I asked the next question on the list, “Have you ever been to a prostitute?” ha, ha, ha. A very awkward yet honest answer ensued. My student had started his career as a sailor and as a sailor often frequented prostitutes in ports all around the world. Thank goodness his eyes were closed and he couldn’t see that my face was red as a beet.

Awkward moment #3

Awkward moment #3 also involves a 2nd Conditional Exercise. Who knew that grammar could be so dangerous? The student in this case was a very nice, soft-spoken middle manager. He was so nice in fact that he made up a wife to talk about in order to make the lessons more interesting. It almost backfired on him when he invited the secretary on a date and I told her that he was married!

Question: Would you donate a kidney to a stranger?

Answer: No. (That’s not the shocking part.)

Question: Would you donate a kidney to a family member?

Answer: No. (Still not shocking)

Question: Would you donate a kidney to your child?

Answer: No. (There’s the shock for ya.)

Chris: No?! Not even your own child!?

Selfish, middle manager: No.

Chris: But, but why not?

Selfish, middle manager: I have only one kidney.

Totally embarrassed English teacher: Oh, sorry about that.

One-kidneyed, middle manager (There’s one-legged so I guess that is how to write one-kidneyed): That’s ok, you didn’t know. Maybe my wife could donate her kidney…

Misiu has reminded me that I have also had awkward moments while teaching in the US-maybe next time.

What about your awkward moments?