English, as a language, is considered by many as a difficult language to learn. There are two possible reasons why. First is because its history is very rich and complicated. Over the centuries, it has grown to incorporate spelling patterns from a number of languages, not to mention the pronunciation. Second is because the alphabet that we know today was created for languages with only five vowels. English, as weird as it already is, has 16 vowels (think of English as a speech and not written English).

If you surf the Internet or if you’re fond of reading English novels, you are sure to encounter more than a few sentences that confuse you, especially if English isn’t even your second language. A few examples, as passed on by a linguist, are as follows:

1. The farm was used to produce produce.
2. The insurance was invalid for the invalid.
3. They were too close to the door to close it.
4. The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert.
5. Since there is no time like the present, he thought it was time to present the present.
6. I had to subject the subject to a series of tests.
7. The buck does funny things when the does are present.

There are also other peculiarities present in some English words. For example, there isn’t any pine or an apple in a pineapple. A boxing ring is never round. A quicksand actually works slowly. A sweetmeat is a candy and a sweetbread is actually a meat. How strange is that?!

Another thing that we should look at is logic. It is not present in the English language. Think about singulars and plurals. If the plural of foot is feet, how come the plural of booth is booths? Why do people call it shipping by truck and sending cargo by ship? Here are a few more examples, author also unknown:

1. One fowl is a goose, but two are called geese, yet the plural of moose should never be “meese”.
2. A man’s nose can run and his feet can smell.
3. Slim chance and fat chance means one and the same thing.
4. You may find a lone mouse or a nest full of mice; yet the plural of house is houses, not “hice”.
5. We’ll begin with a box, and the plural is boxes; but the plural of ox became oxen not “oxes”.

With all this information, we cannot blame people who unintentionally make a fool out of themselves when they stammer in the middle of a sentence or when their subject-verb agreement doesn’t exactly agree. Wrong grammar, mispronunciation, misspelling- these are everywhere. You can see several proofs of how difficult the language is, and oddly, these evidences go as far as being posted on huge billboards – all escaping the scrutiny of editors and proofreaders. Below are a few examples.

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Mastering the English language is easier said than done. It is confusing, tricky and complicated. Yet, with the diligence of a good student, it is not impossible. Knowing and understanding English, being the universal language that it is, is a skill one can always make use of.

All images from Engrish.com and Himantayon.com