Comments

Hi, Jim. Thank you for your posts which are witty and thought-provoking, I enjoy reading your blog very much. I often hear people from other countries saying about Japan, "How come trains arrive so precisely on time in this country?" In fact, trains in Japan are not so punctual as they are said. Every morning, when our packed commuter train arrives at Shibuya station, one of the most crowded station in Tokyo, the conductor makes this announcement seriously,"Due to congestion, this train arrives at Shibuya with 3-minute delay. We deeply apologize for this delay and troubles caused." Is 3-minute delay a big deal in UK?

Hi all, and thank you Jim once again for a very interesting and instructive blog, as others, I also enjoy reading you entries. I, like you, have travelled a bit; I also have lived abroad over 10 years, so I can say that different nationalities and different customs don´t bother me too much. Here in Finland we don´t have too many foreigners and hence maybe we Finns are not used to foreign people as much as we should have. One thing that seems to strike foreigners is our custom to remove our shoes when entering a house. A friend of mine from Scotland asked me, during our latest get-together, why you take your shoes off we you go in. That got me thinking… We just do, we always have, besides it keeps the house tidy. This note is also a bid of farewell; I am taking off to Greece on Saturday for a holiday, not only for pleasure, as the purpose of our visit is also language learning. I have been studying Greek for a year. Best to everyone!

Hi Jim, Unfortunately the place I am living is not a multi-ethnic society. It is interior part of rural south India. You can have a chance to meet the people from different countries only in cities and metros. There were some of the Japanese students here few years back to learn English in the university through university exchange programme. So it is not possible for me now to meet the foreigners and ask about their idea on my country. I had a chance to work with two of the girls from London for two months fifteen years ago. They came to India to work in social welfare agencies as volunteers. Before entering into the university and after finishing the school studies some of the students opt to go other countries like those girls. One of those girls wanted to pursue law studies and other one was aiming for literature. I questioned myself how the experience in other countries helped them to learn in their own countries. I am sure that they have high regards for Indian and simple life of rural Indian people. They laughed at me when I pronounced snake and chaos. They tried to correct my pronunciation. I felt very much I did not use them to learn my English language on that time. I should have tried little more effort to enhance my level of English. Any how those two girls influenced me in certain level to upgrade my language though it was a short period of time.

Hello, Jim! I talked to the young people from England, Hungary and Switzerland that I met at the music festival last week. Some of them are too young to remember the bad reputation that Serbia had during the wars in the 1990s, and I hope that good memories will stick in their minds ‘cause they told me that they thought this was a country of friendly and peaceful people, and I hope that Serbia will live up to this good reputation.

Hi Jim! I asked to my friend´s granny who came from Japan to Brazil after WWII, what comes to her mind when she thinks about Brazil. She told me that which comes to her mind are two words: opportunity and hope. Even though she didn´t know the language, she managed to cope with the culture differences, succeed in life and made my country her home :-). Good bye for now, Ana Paula.

Hi Jim! I asked to my friend´s granny who came from Japan to Brazil after WWII, what comes to her mind when she thinks about Brazil. She told me that which comes to her mind are two words: opportunity and hope. Even though she didn´t know the language, she managed to cope with the culture differences, succeed in life and made my country her home :-). Good bye for now, Ana Paula.

Thank you for your very interesting post again, Jim, your post let me think about a lot of things about my country. This is actually my first time posting the comment here. I've been visiting BBC blog for some time, though. So far, I've been to some countries for different reasons, I visited Canada, India, studied in China for a couple of years, now I’m living in Turkey for work. My experience of visiting these countries totally made me realize the world is getting really smaller as you mentioned on previous post. I feel happy about the fact that most of people I met during the past, having good image of my country. But on the other hand, I also found that some people have some negative image of South Korea which is full of political problem. I guess this is because what they hear about Korea on media is all about North Korea’s nuclear issue. So for those who haven’t been to South Korea or may not know well about South Korea, they easily first think of North Korea’s image when they think of South Korea which makes me feel little sad since it kind of reminds me of our nation’s tragedy again. Just out of curiosity, I’m wondering what kind of image you had first before you are getting aware of South Korea?

Thank you for your very interesting post again, Jim, your post let me think about a lot of things about my country. This is actually my first time posting the comment here. I've been visiting BBC blog for some time, though. So far, I've been to some countries for different reasons, I visited Canada, India, studied in China for a couple of years, now I’m living in Turkey for work. My experience of visiting these countries totally made me realize the world is getting really smaller as you mentioned on previous post. I feel happy about the fact that most of people I met during the past, having good image of my country. But on the other hand, I also found that some people have some negative image of South Korea which is full of political problem. I guess this is because what they hear about Korea on media is all about North Korea’s nuclear issue. So for those who haven’t been to South Korea or may not know well about South Korea, they easily first think of North Korea’s image when they think of South Korea which makes me feel little sad since it kind of reminds me of our nation’s tragedy again. Just out of curiosity, I’m wondering what kind of image you had first before you are getting aware of South Korea?

Hi Jim! I’ve been busy in and out like a fiddler’s arm. I bet you’ve been rushed off your feet to mark the students essays, too. Your post got me thinking of a specific incident. It was when I was a nipper, who was full of beans and a terrible tomboy, who saw a westerner in my deadly quiet and very small hometown. He was gigantically tall comparing to the town’s people with huge blue eyes in an army uniform. My eyes were bulging with fear and my feet were stuck to the ground. I had never seen or met that sort of an alien or intruder in my life. I nearly felt faint and dropped dead at the scene when he said ‘hello’ to me in Korean. It was an eye opening event and I realised there were lots of different human beings existed in the world. I have met some old people who were at the Korean War where I l live now. What a small world! When I asked them what their first impressions about my country were they replied, it was wintry cold and an undeveloped county but Korean soldiers were so kind and lovely. I think it’s high time I stopped banging on about small talk. Have a great day!

Hi, Teacher Jim. England really is an exemple of the world in one city, there is one uncontable nunber of students of world desiring to visit, to study or to live in england, the migrations officers should have been very busy lately!!!kk when I was at the university, one of my friends decided to stop studing english and to travel to England, this way he thought that he would learn english faster, in fact, he is in england right now living and working as lots of other brazilians, unhappy some news about the brazilian community in England are not very good, one family burned in one old building and the death of jean charles killed by the police. teacher JIM, Did you know any brazilian there? if yes, what did they do for living? what is oppinion about the process of integration of the UE?. see you..

Hi Jim, I should have written that I've been busy in and out like a fiddler's elbow- NOT a fiddler's arms. Silly me!!!!

Hi Jim, good topic (for me the best that I’ve ever read here). You know perfectly how catch our attention and to led us to improve better english. Two on one. Formation and entertainment. Well going to the bussines. I’ve asked to my english pen friends from all around the world what were their impresions about Spain and its spaniards. Here there is the literal comment of Hyoshil (born in Korea and living in Uk). “bring to mind- hot and dry summer, bullfighting, flamengo with fast music and sexy, inviting and enticing gestures of the dancers”. I must confess that I’m from another part of Spain where bullfighting and flamenco are not usual. (in fact both aspects doesn’t like me) But….. honestly speaking I agree with her in the aspects of the dancers and the music. I never saw the fantastic movements of the dancers, and it are very, very artistic. Speaking about bullfighting I’m ashamed about this activity. Sorry bad I can’t make an aproach to this activity. Under my point of view it is free violence without sense.

I like the way you start to talk about Globalization. A very natural way to lead people. This is the first time I've been here, and now, I will keep visiting this site. Thanks, teacher :)

Hi Jim, here I'm again. I enter for only saying that all my pen friends have asked me. I enjoyed some months ago in facebook in a multicultural group from all around the world. Trust in me, it was my best idea for improve my english and to know the world. Virtually all of them have answered about their impressions about my country. This experience has been very, very valuable. I invite people to try this experience in a social net site. It has no price. See you, Toni