(I teach English as a second language to international students.)

Me: “Good afternoon, class. Welcome to Level Five Conversation. Let’s start by going around and introducing ourselves.”

Student #1: “I’m from Japan, and my name is Shoko.”

Student #2: “I’m also from Japan, and my name is Hiroko.”

Student #3: “I’m from Japan, too! My name is Kyoko.”

Student #4: “I’m from Mexico, and my name is Socorro. But no one ever calls me that – you can call me Coco.”

(I probably still could have managed okay, but Shoko and Hiroko were best friends and always sat together, so I never did learn to tell them apart…)

(I go to a military school. Once a week we have mandatory dinners for “company spirit.” This week, my engineering group and I have a large project that requires work in the computer lab, so we arrange to meet there after dinner. I arrive only fifteen minutes late. Note: I am female; the other two are male.)

Me: “Hey, sorry I’m late. Had to run back for some notes I left behind.”

Classmate: “B******t!”

Me: “Uh, excuse me?”

Classmate: “You’re wearing make-up. Why do you women always have do that s***?”

Me: “Hey. a**-hole, I wore this to dinner. I’m late because I was working on the problem earlier and accidently left some notes on my desk and had to run back and get them. For the record, you’ve been in the same fight classes as me. You know I don’t worry about stuff like that when s*** is important. I wore it to make myself feel good. Now, you want the solution or not, jack-a**?”

Classmate: “…”

(We got down to business and finished two hours early, thanks to my work. He never questioned my choice to wear make-up again.)

My grandmother and her sister (my great-aunt) were raised Lutheran, but at one point, their dad put them in Catholic school because he thought they would get a better education there.

This was back when the nuns were the teachers and the Mother Superior was the principal.

They were in the school barely two weeks when my grandmother dared question her teacher about something. The nun rapped her knuckles with a ruler and told her to go to the Mother Superior. My grandmother instead went to her sister’s class, and said the Mother Superior wanted to see my great-aunt. Once they were in the hallway, my grandmother told her, “Get your things. We’re leaving.”, and they went home!

When their dad got home, they told him what had happened. The very next day, he went to the school take them out for good, and to read the Mother Superior the riot act.

(One of our classmates is a ditz, and very aware of it. We all like her very much, and she provides great entertainment for the class. Our teacher is explaining a book classification system, telling us it was created in 1933 in India.)

Teacher: “We don’t use it here much, but the theory on which it was based has been used to create search engines online, like Google.”

Classmate: “Wow, I didn’t think they had the Internet back then!”

Related:
A Catalog Of Errors, Part 3
A Catalog Of Errors, Part 2
A Catalog Of Errors

(One of the classroom lights does not come on.)

Teacher: “Everyone raise your hands!”

(All the students do so.)

Teacher: “That’s odd. I thought ‘Many hands make light work.’”