Lissette Lorenz

Author’s note: I was supposed to have posted this at the end of my first semester of teaching way back in December, but for some reason it just sat in my drafts folder. It’s almost half a year later, but here it is!

So I haven’t written in a while, and I apologize. I got so accustomed to life here in Tokyo that I felt like I had nothing new to write about. Does that mean I haven’t been adventuring? Kinda. They’ve become quieter, definitely. Paying insurance and electricity bills; buying winter clothes and figuring out how to use the heater; signing up for dance lessons…

So while things have settled down to a leisurely, pleasurably mundane pace, I would like to turn your attention to the literary bounty I have collected in the classroom over the past couple of months.

My Students’ Writing Excerpts:

How are you? Is not he catching a cold etc? I am cold and do not come out of bedding. Although it is a fellow who cannot carry out English, I need your help well.
[Teacher’s comment: It’s easy to tell that you used translation software.]

We went to the Syurijo Peace Memory Museum and the ocean. This ocean was very beautiful. I stayed there for four days. I was hard.
[Teacher’s comment: Really? For four days straight? That can’t be good for your health.]

My Sunday is relax day. I will get up very late and I will eat late breakfast. After I will spend corrupt weekend. I think every weekend. My life is monotonous.
[Teacher’s comment: I think you mean “lazy” but it sounds quite poetic as it is. I like it.]

I went to the Churaumi Aquarium. I looked forward to watching a dugong. I watched a dugong for 20 minutes. The dugong was very cute. I was healed by the dugong. I came to love the dugong, so I bought a dugong’s stuffed toy in a souvenier shop. The toy is now by my pillow.
[Teacher’s comment: I never knew dungongs existed! You taught me something new. Thanks!]

　
The dugong is a cousin of the manatee.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dugong

I want to tell you about my high school trtip. I went to okinawaw. Everybody enjoyed, but I didn’t have fun because I wasn’t able to act with the friend of the good friends. I don’t want ot remember it very much. But I don’t want to forget that the sea of okinawaw was clean.
[Teacher’s comment: Clean seas are worth remembering.]

I will in Hachijouji ten years from now. I will have a pen. This is nice pen. This pen is elegance. I will wear beret. This beret is red. I will wear round glass. I will write manuscript. So I am going to novelist.
[Teacher’s comment: I would happily read one of your novels if they sound as good as this. This is not sarcasm. Seriously.]