How times have changed since I first travelled to Der Jugendherberge in German class, with Juergen Schmidt, at the tender age of 11. These days, modern language textbooks come with a healthy dose of didacticism and include inspirational stories of triumph over adversity, from Maria and the Nazis to the life of Mother Teresa, via recycling, volunteer work, going green, Great Moments in Japanese History and the disturbingly creepy "Uncle Nick at the Rodeo".
Meet the cast. Annoying goody-goody Yuki, tomboy Momoko, smoove Andy and bratty American exchange student Mike, with whom Yuki shares some simmering sexual tension.
Accompanying the series are some truly dire *live action* videos, from the Acorn Antiques school of film making.
Here are some of the more (unintentionally) entertaining pages, aimed at 12-15 yr old students:
Holy Sony Walkmans, Batman! They're going to disconnect the mainframe!
Crazy Old Maurice and his "clean energy" schtick
Some amateur genealogy. According to this chart, the homo sapien is the bastard lovechild of the chimpanzee and bonobo, and brother of the gorilla.
Omigud, I so totally know what she means. I'm constantly thinking in Swahili and speaking Norwegian.
Could be worse. I could be teaching Japanese. And in Papua New Guinea, like this poor guy.
Yuki's visiting London! Or rather, the sanitised Houses of Parliament and the Millennium Wheel. Perish the thought she should see a Soho crack den, Hackney council estate or the dogging area of Clapham Common.
Season Two, and the ensemble cast expands to include tow-haired Jim and Paulo, a rogue Brazilian. Momoko now sports a fetching lilac ensemble to reflect her new, 14-yr-old sensibilities. Yuki has moved her arm 90 degrees.
Third grade features the aptly named hapless blonde bimbo, Jenny. One of those naive young English girls, culturally clueless and mortally offended by anything and everyone around her. Bloody gaijin.
The completely inexplicable but always welcome appearance of Julie Andrews.
This is what a real textbook looks like
Sample page
Never say you don't learn anything from these pages. Note that the Japanese translation for "I'm coming" is actually "I'm going." Typical Japanese - always one step ahead.
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