text message

here in china, text messaging seems to be the only way to communicate with each other. for one thing it's wicked cheap. so we always get funny text messages from our students who try to explain things to us in english, but clearly have no idea what the english word really means that they just wrote.

for example tonight i got a gem of a text message:
"dear mr. wu, i'm vivian (name changed to protect the identity). sorry to disturb you. there appears herpes simplex virus infection again. it's a great pity to miss your class again. i'll be back next week. thank you!"

ahh classic :) thank you chinese-english dictionary. and yes it is a big pity, but a bigger pity for you and your virus.