Remember having a pen pal in school? In grade school I exchanged letters to a Mexican pen pal in English, and in SD I had a Japanese pen pal whom I tried to write to in Japanese.
God, my letters were horrible. For any of you that knew me in school, Japanese was by far the most difficult class I ever took. If I hadn't taken it pass/no-pass I would probably still be there, trying to complete the stupid Revelle language requirement until the end of time. Anyways, if you thought speaking and listening to a Japanese was confusing, wait until you have to write it. Honestly, I beleive that the ONLY way to truly master the Japanese language is to be born and raised in a Japanese household, to a Japanese family, in Japan.
My first letter to my pal was the literary equivalent of Duplo - I pretty much only was able to tell him my name, where I lived, boy/girl, hobbies...the usual pen pal stuff. I can't imagine the laughs my pal got from receiving a poorly written letter from a then 20-yr old guy who likes videogames, pizza, and movies.
His reponse to me looked like an advanced Japanese textbook, in which it took me 5 hours to decipher that it was snowing quietly outside his bedroom and that his orange cat was rubbing the soles of his feet with his soft kitten pads while he was writing the letter. What a poet! I wasted 5 hours of my afternoon for you to tell me this? Couldn't you just tell me if you liked pizza?
Those were the only letters that crossed; I'm pretty sure he wouldn't want to waste anymore time dumbing down his letters for me and I simply didn't have the brain power to read and respond accordingly. Besides, I completely exhausted my list of favorite foods, movies, and colors to him.
But thinking of pen pals reminded me how much I thought it was cool to talk to another kid somewhere else. I want another pen pal, but for it to be different. I want to verbally spar and abuse through these letters...I want...a pen foe. Of course it would be in English, but someone to match wits with and piss em' off. I don't need anymore pals, I want more enemies. A good enemy would be fun to write to. Will you be my pen foe?
