My younger brother just entered middle school and has the choice between some electable classes.

Brother: “Sis, you learn law in school, right?”

Me: “Just a bit. Why?”

Brother: “I want to sue my teacher. Is there a law that says they can’t refuse to let boys into any classes they let girls into?”

I find a law that says roughly what he wants. He thanks me and leaves, and I get to read the full text. It’s a law regarding discrimination at work.

The next day, my brother rushes into my room.

Brother: “I did it! They let me into the cooking class!”

Customer: “I want to buy some jeans.”

My colleague helps her try on some different styles and the customer chooses a pair that fits nicely. She then starts to use a pendulum above the pair of jeans.

Customer: “I can’t buy them if their vibrations are off!”

About fifteen years ago, I got a job as an English teacher at a German high school. It took me some time to realise that the other English teachers weren’t really that good at speaking or teaching English. This is the story of one event that made me lose all respect for their abilities.

The school had a charity drive to collect money for an orphanage in India. One year, some of the nuns who ran the orphanage came to visit the school. There was going to be a big event, with all students attending, where the nuns would talk about what that money was used for. The principal asked me to translate their answers to the assembly. The students had prepared some questions in their English classes to ask, and I was supposed to translate the answers.

To my horror, every single one of the questions was in something that might have resembled English but was utterly incomprehensible. Of course, the nuns didn’t understand a word they were saying, so I just made something up, based on one or two nouns I thought might have been part of the question.

Unfortunately, the nuns had very thick Indian accents that I wasn’t familiar with, so when I translated the answers to the questions I had made up, I also had to improvise. Basically, I had a conversation with myself. In the end, the students learned that the money they raised was used for building toilets (I think) and that the Indian kids’ favourite food was chicken.

I have been working at a small pub in my hometown for around two years now. Our pub was once a hardcore biker bar, so most of our staff are either a little crazy or know how to fight.

I am on shift with a coworker, working in the outside area which can seat around a hundred people. During summer, we rarely serve anybody inside, so the inside bar never has anyone working behind it, but we do put signs up everywhere stating that they can get served outside. To get to our outside area, you have to walk all the way through the pub.

At around 3:00 am, a man walks up to the bar and tries ordering some shots.

Customer: “When we came inside, nobody served us, so we went behind the bar and poured our own beer!”

Assuming it’s a joke, I laugh a little and keep on pouring his shots, until he pulls out his phone and shows me video proof of himself and another guy going behind our bar, getting a glass, and pouring a beer for each one of them while absolutely splashing beer everywhere.

We kick him out — and his friend, after finding him, as well.

But because drunk guys don’t like getting kicked out by a 168-cm (just over 5’5″ in American), twenty-year-old woman, one of them runs back inside and gets a hold of about a hundred coasters. He starts throwing them at me and my coworker and about fifty at the few customers we still have.

I am literally chasing a fifty-year-old man out of the pub while he is screaming like a maniac.

Me: “You’re banned for life!”

Well, that doesn’t sit right with them, so they start calling my coworker all sorts of racial slurs just because he told them they are trespassing.

What ensues is probably the saddest fight I’ve ever seen.

The two men start hitting my coworker and me. We end the fight by knocking one out, and the other one runs away. We get two of our usual guests to watch over him until he wakes up. When he does, he screams at them to call the cops.

Regular: “First of all, you’ve broken about three laws, and second, you’re on camera for all of them.”

This prompted him to run away, as well.

The owner posted the videos on Facebook and Instagram, and now those two are banned from every bar and club in town. 

Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.

My cousin and I were traveling around Europe. We met up with a German girl who I’d hosted during her year in the US, and we ended up staying in Berlin for a couple of nights. We were traveling cheap, so we chose to go with a hostel. When we were checking in, I decided to ask the front desk clerk a few questions, but this one was the best.

Me: “Do you have a code for the front door?”

Clerk: “No.”

Me: “So, it doesn’t lock after a certain time?”

Clerk: “Yes. It locks at 11:00.”

Me: “My friends and I were hoping to go out tonight. Would we be able to get back in? Is there a key we should take?”

Clerk: “We have a night attendant who can open the door. But you should come early because he takes his nap and does not like to be disturbed.”

Me: “?!”

I’ve stayed in plenty of hostels, and they’re all pretty good. This was my first experience with a hostel that didn’t run so smoothly.