trevallion

So, I work with a lot of Laotian people. Laos is a tiny country next to Vietnam and Thailand if you're not hip to Southeast Asia. A few nights ago the two guys that I work with regularly informed me that a lot of Laotian people don't like Japanese people. I'm against racism, but I decided to soak in this bit of culture seeing as I don't understand much about either the Japanese or Laos. It seems that it's not so much of a hatred thing so much as they think Japanese people take themselves to seriously and (I guess) look down on other asians. This explanation was followed by fits of both of them shouting of random Japanese words in what I now refer to as Serious Japanese Movie Accent followed by Generic Martial Arts Yell. Like "MITSUBISHI TAMAGACHI ARIGATO, HAI!". I don't get much entertainment at work, so this is keeping me amused. It kinda reminds me of Americans that poke fun of Canadians without really ever having met a Canadian.

Speaking of Asia, by the way, I need to take a foriegn language this fall and I'm leaning towards either Chinese or Japanese. Which do you recommend? Keep in mind that I found several reviews for the Japanese professor saying that she was crazy and insulting, and the Chinese teacher had one review for another subject that made him sound like a decent teacher, but that doesn't mean he's good at teaching Chinese.