Chinese Stories in English
Jokefest Page 1
Jokes 1-8 from Today’s Insufferable Students by Dai Shurong (代淑蓉)
2013 Annual Humorous Writings of China, Comedy World Magazine, Ding Si, Ed., p.162
Translated from version available here
Jokes 9-12 from Exam Anecdotes by Xia Yiming (夏一鸣)
Segmented Readings 5, also available here
Jokes 13-22 from An Inventory of Electrifying Teacher-Student Jokes (Edited)
Segmented Readings 7, also available here, authorship unattributed
1. Teacher: You’re really too much. We can ignore your copying someone else’s test paper in language class, but the despicable thing is, you actually even copied the homework, too, and without changing a word. Please give me an explanation that will tone down my anger a little!
Student: I had a lot of respect for the original creation.
Teacher: You respected the original? Then why didn’t you write the other guy’s name on your test paper. That was part of his original creation, too.
Student: That was because I not only respected the original, I also respected the teacher.
2. Teacher: I never saw you smoke on regular school days. Why do you have to smoke before this test?
Student: Mainly because I didn’t prepare well enough for the test.
Teacher: You didn’t prepare well, so you have to smoke? Where’s the logic in that?
Student: Actually I’m not smoking. I’m burning incense as an offering to the gods so they’ll bless me with a high score.
Teacher: I figured you were burning incense. But people who burn incense burn three sticks at a time. Why are you burning seven sticks at once?
Student: It’s because there’re seven subjects on this test, not three.
3. Teacher: Why are you sleeping in class?
Student: So as not to be a distraction for the students on my left and right.
Teacher: Sounds like you’re one terrific person, but this joke you’re telling is really too funny.
Student: When I got to class they said they wanted me to play [the card game] “Struggle Against the Landlord” with them. I shook my head and told them I was tired and wanted to sleep. Actually I wanted them to be one player short so couldn’t play and would pay attention to your lecture.
4. Teacher: What are you eating?
Student: An egg.
Teacher: You’ve gone too far, having the audacity to eat in class in plain sight. Why’d you do it?
Student: My brain was slow and I couldn’t understand anything you were saying in class, so I ate an egg for supplemental nutrition. I sincerely hoped to understand your lesson!
5. Teacher: Just now this student saw you continuously playing games on your cell phone. I think you must have thoroughly grasped the essence of this session’s lesson, so next I’d like to discuss this poem of Tagore’s with you in detail: The Furthest Distance in the World.
Student: No, no, I wouldn’t presume. But I’ll do the best I can.
Teacher:
“The furthest distance in the world
“Is not between life and death
“But when I stand in front of you
“Yet you don’t know that I love you”
I’d like to have you write the same kind of verse imitating this sentence.
Student:
The furthest distance in the world
Is not between life and death
But when I stand in front of you
Yet you don’t know that I’m your student.
6. Teacher: I’ve got to hand it to you. Even though you’re sitting here in the test hall, during a test, you’re still able to sleep like a baby. I really don’t know what you’re thinking.
Student: I’m not thinking anything. Thinking gives me a headache.
Teacher: What you’re saying is, you can’t do even one of the test questions?
Student: That depends on the student in the row in front of me. If he can answer nine questions, I can answer nine questions.
7. Teacher: you don’t come to class very often, but you occupy a space with your books. Don’t you feel guilty? Since you don’t come to class, you really could do a good deed and give up your place to someone who couldn’t get in!
Student: I have been coming!
Teacher: You’ve been here? How come I haven’t seen you?
Student: My physical body wasn’t in class, but my spirit was!
8. Teacher: I only went on for one minute after the bell. What are you all so worked up about?
Student: Because you went against two natural laws.
Teacher: What laws?
Student: One is: Anything you force people to do won’t be agreeable. The other is: It’s hard to sit still when you’ve got to pee.
9. Metal Detector
All the exam proctors wanted to use a metal detector to physically check the candidates outside the Chinese I exam hall. They wanted to prevent students from bringing cell phones, watches and other electronic devices into the testing room.
The detector emitted an ear piercing buzz while one candidate was being scanned. The candidate was taken aback and, in a flurry of activity, quickly turned his trouser and coat pockets inside out. "There’s nothing," he said innocently. I scanned him again with the detector and again it sounded a loud warning.
The candidate was nervous and made a grand gesture to take his clothes off in order to prove his innocence. That’s when I noticed that the buttons on his clothes, from top to bottom and row after row, were all iron!
10. Bathroom Trip
It was at an afternoon math test. The students were all art majors and the questions may have been somewhat difficult for them. About 50 minutes in, one of the candidates put his head down on his desk and fell asleep. It was my duty as proctor to give him a warning, so I gently nudged his arm. Before long, though, his head was on the desk again.
I woke him up again. After a while, he looked like he was sitting there in severe pain. He raised his hand and asked, "Teacher, can I smoke?"
“No,” I told him sternly, “this is an exam room.
“Can I go to the toilet?” he asked next.
“That you can do," I answered. “However, you’ll need two monitors to go with you. Shall I call them for you?”
“That’s OK,” he said with regret. “I can hold it for a while.” Maybe he was thinking, with two people guarding him, how would he be able to go?
11. Repeaters
Before exams, we proctors have to check the candidate's identity cards and test authorizations to prevent the use of ringers. When I examined one candidate's ID photo, I felt his appearance was different no matter how I looked at it, because he was much younger in the picture.
While I was looking back and forth between him and the photo, the candidate pulled a piece of paper from his pocket. “Teacher,” he said, I certainly am myself. This is my proof of residence from the police precinct. I’ve been reviewing [for the test] for three years. I look a lot older than my photo, don’t I?”
12. Wiping Her Nose
One of the candidates in the test hall may have had a cold. She occasionally took toilet paper out her pants pocket and wiped her nose with it. But I noticed that, before wiping her nose, she invariably held the toilet paper up above her head and moved it back and forth twice, the front and then the back side.
I was curious. Could it be that some secret notes were written on the papers? Or was she sending secret messages to someone? I walked over to give her a warning. She got embarrassed and explained, “There’s video surveillance in the exam room, isn’t there? I was doing it for the camera to see, to prove that the papers I took out were clean and you wouldn’t mistakenly think I’d smuggled cheat sheets into the exam hall.”
13. No Filling
In college, Student A liked to get up early to exercise. Once, on his way back to the dorm, he bought a steamer of dragon mini-buns (steamed bread stuffed with pork filling). He left them on his desk while he went to wash up, but when he came out, they were gone!
He was very angry, so when he bought mini-buns the next morning, he made a show of licking each one in front of everyone in the dorm. This time, when he came out after washing up, the buns were still there, but the pork stuffing was gone….
14. "Ringtone" Girl
One day, while all the students had their heads down studying, one of them turned to the boy behind him and asked, "Do you know there's a new student they call the 'Ringtone Girl' in the class next door?"
The boy perked up. "Ringtone Girl", he thought, "what a beautiful name!"
"Is she pretty?" he asked.
"Not at all. They call her 'Ringtone Girl' because she always steps into the classroom just as the bell's ringing."
15. Unexpected
Student A liked girl C but had never approached her. Two of his buddies helped him think of some ideas. After discussing the problem, they came up with the Hero Saves Damsel in Distress ploy.
One evening when the weather was miserable, the two friends dressed up as vagrants and accosted C as she was on her way home from school. "C'mon, sweet thing, let's go have some fun," they said, leering at her.
C said, "Great!"
And A, the student, scrunched in a corner of a wall and watched the three of them as their backs faded into the distance, tears flowing down his face….
16. Added On
A rather eccentric young student had long worshiped the girl of his dreams from afar. Finally he said to her, "I've liked you since a long time ago. Would it be possible…."
The girl interrupted him. "Sorry, I'm in a relationship."
Eccentric Boy: "In that… in that case, I'm sorry, I said something I shouldn't have. Well, I'll be going now."
Girl: Wait a minute!"
The boy was uncertain. "Huh?"
Girl: "I think, even if I wasn't in a relationship, I wouldn't get together with you…."
17. Dorm Search
Officers from the local Police Precinct came onto campus at eleven o'clock one night. They said there was a bad guy who had snuck into the dorm and they wanted to search for him.
They didn't find the gad guy, but the search of forty men's rooms did find 60 girls from this school or other
schools….
The dean's complexion….
18. Plagiarism
The moron plagiarized an assignment. The teacher caught him and he was called into the office.
"I want you to write an essay on 'My Experience with Plagiarism," the teacher said sternly.
The moron appeared reluctant. "Who's written anything like that," he muttered to himself, and where would I go to copy it."
Delivering Take-out
Two hundred people were in the lecture hall at a college summer session. The professor was on the podium speaking animatedly when he noticed a shadowy figure wandering outside the door. He figured it was a student who had arrived late and was afraid to come in.
He went over and opened the door. "Come right on in, son."
A fellow dressed in red came in slowly and said, "Who ordered the KFC?"
19. The Voice of China
I think that student's seats in classrooms should be like the judges' chairs on the TV talent show The Voice of China. If it's a good lecture they can turn to face the teacher to listen, and if it's not, they can swivel around the other direction and play games on their cell phones.
20. Not the Class Flower
My gal pal tested into an engineering college. One day she called me on the phone and said that in her class of over a hundred people, only two were girls.
I was a bit jealous. "Aren't you the lucky one!" I said.
My friend sighed. "There really is only two of us girls," she said, "and I'm still not the prettiest in the class…."
21. Head Start
On the street, I bumped into the guy who'd sat behind be in the test, and who'd constantly been looking at my test paper.
"Where are you going," he asked.
"To review my lessons. There's another test the day after tomorrow."
"Oh, go on ahead, then. As the proverb says, a slow sparrow has to get an early start."
22. A Splendid Education
The junior high teacher says: "You don't need to understand this problem now. Your senior high teacher will explain it."
The senior high teacher says: "I'm not going to talk about this. Your junior high teacher already explained it to you."
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