Who of us hasn't felt compassion and sympathy towards foreigners trying to learn the English language? It's crazy, virtually incomprehensible, as Jay Nordlinger points out in this little post:
Sometimes English drives me nuts. There are certain instances when, in a piece of writing, you want it super-clear that “read” is in the past tense, and not the present, or vice versa. And English, sometimes, thwarts you.
Which reminds me of a story: I once met a foreign woman — can’t quite remember from where — who noted the moment at which she gave up on English. She had studied diligently. (I believe she was Eastern European.) For example, she knew that “read,” in the present tense, is “reed,” whereas in the past tense it is “red.” And she knew that “reading” is always “reeding.”
So she arrived in England and noticed a sign for a town called Reading. “Ah,” she said, “Reeding.” “No,” she was corrected: “Redding.”
She gave up.