Have a date with you?

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English is so hard! The student who emailed this request (Have a date with you?) was not entertaining any strange ideas. We met and had a delightful conversation, part of which focused on the difference between asking to “have a date” and “make an appointment.”

My seniors are wicked smart and can follow complex discussions in English about theory, language, and literature.  Their vocabularies are astounding, even if their phrasing is occasionally amusing. My sophomores, too, are smart, but radically innocent and sweet. Following are some of their comments. I have hundreds more. 

“I’m a sunshine and open-minded girl”

A Mongolian student writes, “In a nutshell, the first impression of English is amazing. It is much better than Chinese calligraphy writing. Pronunciation also very beautiful. It toned ups and downs, not like Chinese each sentence is flat. I find it very interesting. So in the new semester I’ll work harder to recover the time wasted.”

"Liu and Jiao chemistried with each other at first sight"

"Niulang crushed on the pretty girl when he first saw her."

"One day, Jerusha was told a piece of shocked news that she had a chance to go to college."

“Since then, a lot of kinds of books have been read by me. I like reading some stories and novels most, which are very interesting, aren’t they?”

“I am an outgoing boy! In my free time, I’d like to travel some places and playing with my friends. I think it is very interesting.”

“As you all known, through those books [Rebecca and Proud and Prejudice], I’m not only gained so much knowledge, but also wide my eyesight of the whole world.”

“It spend my many years learn well Chinese, when graduated from primary school.”

“She was envied of the beauty of Snow White and tried her best to kill her.  So one day, the queen just employed a person to kill Snow White in the woods and took her cardiac to the queen.”

“Xi Xian and Bai Suzhen fall in love at their first sight experienced 81 difficulties.”

“In front of his house standed two big mountains blocked traffic badly and brought much inconvenience for his family.”

"Ruoul wasn't sort of people who was behaved."

"When Zhu heard this news, she choose to suicide"

But guess what—their English is fabulous compared to my Putonghua. In fact, there’s no comparison.