December 11th, 2001. The hardest working man in show business.

I had fun today at work. There were lots of free lessons, as usual, so the manager decided that it was high time we started earning our keep. He made the lot of us with spare periods stand outside in the freezing cold and hand out leaflets. All of a sudden, I had the worst job in Japan. It was a lost cause though, we stood outside saying "Nova desu" for a good 20 minutes and gave away only 2 flyers. People here just don't care. And why should they? There were at least 4 other people there handing crap out too.

Question: What is the hardest thing on Earth?

Answer: Trying to explain why sarcasm is funny to Japanese people.

I went into my conversation class and asked what they thought embodied the word "funny." All I got were smiles all around. Big surprise. So I decided to lead it off and told a joke.

"What is red and orange and looks great on Hippies? Fire." Silence.

"Ok, ok forget that one. Did you hear about the constipated mathematician? He worked it out with a pencil." Blank stares in the place of smiles.

Alright, I give up. I then had them tell me some Japanese jokes. Apparently, toilet humour doesn't go over too well here, nor does sarcasm. So what do the Japanese think is funny? Puns. Yes, puns.

Needless to say, it was my turn with the blank stares and silence now. All in all, it was lots of fun, and even though we didn't get each other's humour, we all had a good laugh. To give credit where credit is due, I think it is only fair that I mention I took the first one from a Maxim I read on a fishing trip I went on this summer, and the second one I heard from my grade 7 history teacher, Mr. Newell.