16 March, 2009

Questions and odd English

I have the best question-asker in his Grade 4 class. Have you ever pondered what it is like to parent an inquisitive child like that? And his younger brothers are almost as good. The last two days I've answered (or tried to): "Why, when you have a cold, do you get masses of goobers?" "Why does my nose feel more blocked after I blow than before?" "Why, if I'm sniffing, do I need to put a jumper on?" (You have to know that he is not satisfied with a simple answer, he wants proof!) Just before he left for school he asked me: "Why is the sea blue?" How he ended up there, I don't know! His younger brother asked, "Are germs aliens?" That one was easy, but he then pondered "Maybe they are...". Earlier the same brother required a detailed explanation for bowel pain! Sometimes I'm glad I did all that anatomy and physiology back in uni. Now that I'm onto bowels... I have to tell you of some weird English I saw today. It is pretty universally known that you find weird English in non-English speaking countries. Today's WAS pretty memorable though. At the front of my local grocery store I stopped in my tracks at the large pile of toilet paper (packs of 16) for sale. Blue toilet paper. The brand name..."Fruit basket" accompanied by the large picture of a bunch of grapes. I ask you - what were they thinking? Except that I personally detest coloured toilet paper, I would have bought a packet, just to gape at! And taken a photo so you could gape too. I have at least 11 hours before I have to face more question askers.

2 comments:

Dave said...

I wonder if they're trying to trade off the name of a semi-popular Anime?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fruits_Basket

Wendy said...

There could be something in that. It is scary how much we do not know about popular Japanese culture! I'll have to have another look to see if that 's' is there. It is not merely bad English, by the way, it is Japanized-English. They don't actually have a 't' sound which can end words, so it becomes 'tsu' like in tsunami.