Mind Your Language

Papa recently introduced the complete “Mind Your Language“ series to me. It is about a teacher, Mr. Jeremy Brown, the principal, Ms. Courtney, the tea-lady, Gladys, the school janitor, Sid and 10 students, Giovanni Capello (Italian), Maximillian Papandrious (Greek), Anna Schmidt (German), Taro Nagazumi (Japanese), Jamila Ranjha (Indian), Juan Cervantes (Spanish), Ranjeet Singh (Punjabi), Danielle Favre (French), Ali Nadim (Pakistani), and Chung Su-Lee (Chinese). In the second season, 2 new foreigners join the class, Ingrid Svenson (Swedish) and Zoltan Szabo (Hungarian).

My favorite character is Giovanni, Max (Maximillian), Juan, Ingrid and Zoltan. My favorite Giovanni episode is “Queen for a Day”:

Sid : Mr. Italy!

[Giovanni comes out with the ‘Mafia’ outfit]

Mr. Brown : Giovanni, are you representing Italy or the Mafia?

Giovanni : I’m representing Sicily.

Max’s was when he came for his first lesson with Mr. Brown.

Mr. Brown : Your name?

Max : Maximillian Andreas Archimedies Papandrious.

Mr. Brown : I think I’ll just out it down as Max.

[Mr. Brown writes that down]

Mr. Brown : Uh, I take it your Greek?

Max : He is right. From Affense.

Mr. Brown : And what is your job?

Max : Uh, I woke with sheeps.

Mr. Brown : You work with sheeps? A shepherd? You work on a farm?

Max : No, no. Not farm.

Mr. Brown : But you just said that you work with sheep.

Max : No, no, no, no. Sheeps. Big sheeps.

[Max makes the ship hoot]

Mr. Brown : Ahh, ships.

Max : Yes, sheeps. Tonkers.

Mr. Brown : Tonkers? Tankers!

Max : Right! I woke in office.

Mr. Brown : Thank you.

Juan’s part, was when Mr. Brown asks them to do an essay on what they did on the weekend.

Mr. Brown : How about you Juan? What did you do over the weekend?

Juan : Dilmendo.

Mr. Brown : Dilmendo?

[Juan makes an action of sleeping]

Mr. Brown : Ahh, sleeping. Aren’t you a Catholic?

Juan : Si, si. Roman Catholico.

Mr. Brown : Then why aren’t you at church?

Juan : The pope. He say, 6 days, you work. On the 7th day, you rest. I rest.

Ingrid’s, like Giovanni’s, was on the catwalk on ‘Queen for a Day’.

Sid : Ms. Sweden!

[Ingrid walks out]

Ingrid : [to Mr. Brown] Beautiful, yes?

Me. Brown : Beautiful very!

Ingrid : And the dress too?

Mr. Brown : Well, I was referring to that.

Zoltan’s act was a ‘Hungarian mogick’. It also include Ali and Ranjeet’s act in the concert as well.
Ms. Courtney : Carry on, Mr. Brown.

Mr. Brown : And for our first act, Mr. Zoltan Szabo from Hungary!

Zoltan : Hugarian mogick one.

[He takes out a piece of Hungarian newspaper and shred it to pieces]

[He blows on the pieces he scrunched up in his palm and opens it, expecting to open a new piece of paper but only shredded newspaper were falling from his hands.]

Zoltan : Hungarian mogick 2

Ms. Courtney : That’s enough!

Zoltan : You don’t like Hungarian mogick?

Mr. Brown : Just sit down, Zoltan. Next we have Ali Nadim and Ranjeet Singh.

[While jiggling]

Ali :We all have a musical!

Ranjeet : I sing, I sing, I sing!

Ali : Why is a rhinoceros different from an elephant?

Ranjeet : Because none of them can ride a bicycle!

Ali : We have a musical!

Ranjeet : I sing, I sing, I sing!

Ms. Courtney : Stop!

Ali : Why? You no like us?

Ranjeet : A thousand apologies!

That was hilarious.

The best class-episode was once, when Mr. Brown asked them to make a sentence.

Mr Brown : Well, there are eight parts in a sentence. Can anyone tell me what it is?

[Lots of hands shoot up]

Mr. Brown : Ingrid?

Ingrid : Noun

Mr. Brown : Yes. Excellent. Danielle?

Danielle : Pro-noun.

Mr. Brown : Yes. Very good!

Danielle : Hey, why am I very good and she’s excellante?

Mr. Brown : Alright. You’re both excellent.

[and so on until Anna]

Anna : Conjunction

Mr. Brown : What is the eighth part? Come doesn’t anyone know? An interjection. Does anyone know what an interjection is?

Juan : Needle.

Mr. Brown : Pardon?

[Juan makes an imitation of a doctor doing an injection and points at it]

Juan : Interjection

Mr. Brown : No, Juan. Thats an injection.

Juan : Its soright.

Mr. Brown : Alright Ranjeet, give me a pro-noun.

Ranjeet : Indian.

Mr. Brown : Indian? Well, surely you could have thought of something else?

Ranjeet : Well, I cannot say Muslim.

Ali : Why you stupid brown chappati!

Mr. Brown : That’ll be enough, both of you! Now Ranjeet, you are here to learn English, not start a holy war.

Ranjeet : A waiter.

Mr. Brown : Yes, Ranjeet, a waiter. And Max, give me an adjective. Come on, something that describes this waiter.

Max : Khow do I know? I’ve never met this waiter.

Mr. Brown : No, Max. He is not an actual waiter!

Max : Oh, he is a part-time waiter.

Mr. Brown : No, Max. He is an imaginary waiter.

Max : Hokay. He is an hold waiter.

Mr. Brown : Good. An old waiter.

Max : With a mustache.

Mr. Brown : Just old will do , Max. Danielle. What was the waiter doing?

Danielle : The old waiter, was making love.

Mr. Brown : Come on, Danielle. Can’t you think of something better then making love?

Danielle : But I can’t zink nozing better zhen making love.

Mr. Brown : How about something more appropriate to a waiter?

Danielle : Vhwallah! He served.

Mr. Brown : The old waiter served. Taro, what did he do.

Taro : Aso.

[bows]

Taro : The old waiter, served carefullio.

Mr. Brown : Very good, Taro. The old waiter carefully served…Giovanni!

Giovanni : The old waiter, carefully served, fish and chips.

Mr. Brown : Two more nouns and a conjunction.

Giovanni : Okie cocky. The old waiter, carefully served, two more nouns an d a conjunction.

Mr. Brown : No, Giovanni!

Those episodes were hilarious! Well, I guess I will just have to say “Mind Your Language” is fantastic! 🙂

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