Sorry for the PS, I nearly forgot...
Some years ago (14? 13? 12?) I was teaching ESL to a small froup of Japanese girls at a local "Junior College". Of the 5, only one wasn't all that bright; the other 4 simply couldn't express themselves properly in English. Once most of that barrier was demolished, they all ended up on the top of the heap, academically speaking (so, OK, their competition was pitiful, even if they *were* all native speakers <g>).
About midway through our first year, the heir to the Japanese throne decided to get married, and the pwersonal details made quite a splash even in the US papers (we were subscribing to the Washington Post at the time). "Excellent" I thought; "that ought to be interesting enough to motivate them to read English beyond the textbook", and assigned the article as the next class discussion subject.
They all made a beeline for the Washington and Lee U library (which subscribes to a Japanese newspaper, as well as some in other languages), but all (with that one exception <g>) were smart enough to compare the native coverage with the American one - they knew their facts form the native source, but beefed it up with the language from the article I xeroxed for them.
The facts - as I remember them - were that the prince managed to squeak through high school (or home-schooling equivalent), and dropped out of college. His fiancee, OTOH, had college degrees (all the way up to and including a PHD) up her kazoo - Oxford, Harvard, you name it... She also had a very nice job, which she'd have to give up; it ain't fitty for the queen bee to be doing anything other than being ornamental and multiplying for the good of the country... Which is why it took the prince 3 yrs to woo her :)
I asked my girls who - in their opinion - was the "winner" in this marriage... To me, there was no question, but the girl was stepping down, and sacrificing herself on the altar of the "country's good". So, I was totally flabbergasted, when *all 5* declared that *she* was the lucky one, in the best fairy-tale fashion, particularly since he was better looking than she was.
Excuse me???
And, in the Charlie/Camilla case even *that* doesn't apply - she may not be Miss World, but he's just plug ugly :)
--
Tamara P Duvall http://t-n-lace.net/
Lexington, Virginia, USA (Formerly of Warsaw, Poland)
To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace-chat [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
