ALTERNATIVE ENGLISH SCHOOL COURTS CONTROVERSY

A new English Language school opened its doors to the public yesterday, but this was far from a normal opening. The school in question, Big Lemon School of Terrifical Spoken Club, about 20 minutes outside of Kurume, actively teaches the sort of English normally seen on t-shirts and stationary - popularly known as Engrish.

Co-founders Bhan Chakshi and Sonny J'piker have already received an overwhelming amount of both protest emails and letters, and applications to join the school, the former of which question the validity of teaching fundamentally flawed English. Mr Chakshi offered the following statement this morning:

"Out of the many thousands of students here that learn English, only a relative handful of those will go on to real fluency - and naturally the number drops significantly once you factor out the students that go to an English speaking country. We aim to play to the strengths of the Japanese student - encouraging flawed grammar and unnatural sounding communication, with a strong emphasis on cuteness and superficial vim. By doing so, we believe that almost all of our students will become completely fluent in record time."

Reaction amongst local English teachers was mixed - Darren O'Darren from Kurume said that "the gentlemen concerned will have to consider closely their business model and identify a clear customer and service provider blueprint", but Ken MrKen, also from Kurume, said that he was "quite tempted to jack in my high school job and go and work with Bhan and Sonny, if they'll have me".

Only time will tell if Big Lemon School of Terrifical Spoken Club will prosper, but with rumours of all night queueing for lessons and phones running off the hook, the future certainly looks bright.