[OzukakiBurasuki]

Originally Posted by YuriTokoro

Hi.
Could you correct my English?

"Sleeping on the Train"

Many Japanese people sleep sitting on the train. Some sleep standing. You might not believe this. One of my English teachers from The U.S. has said he hadn’t imagined it before he came to Japan but he saw the people every morning in Tokyo.
I’ve never seen people sleeping on the train outside Japan. I wonder what you think when you see people sleeping on the train. I’ve read some foreign man called it “Japanese siesta”.
When I get on the underground train in New York, I tried to sleep out of habit, and then I reminded I wasn’t in Japan, opened my eyes quickly.
Do you sleep on the train in your country?

Thank you.

Many Japanese people sleep sitting on the train. Some sleep standing. You might not believe this.

It would be better if you slimmed down these three sentences in two longer ones.

"It's hard to believe, to foreigners at least, but many Japanese sleep on the train. Most are sitting down, but some sleep while standing up." (You should probably explain that they hold onto the hooks from the ceiling.)

One of my English teachers from The U.S. has said he hadn’t imagined it before he came to Japan but he saw the people every morning in Tokyo.

We have no idea what you are talking about in this sentence, but it is most likely your teacher's reaction to the Japanese sleeping on their train rides. You should omit the "has" from "the U.S. has said he" because it isn't needed. Also, the "the" in "The U.S." should not be capitalized since it is not a part of the proper noun. Next, "hadn't" is a poor choice for this sentence. It might be better to use "never" and only use "had" instead before "never." You should also change "it" to "that" because "that" is the object and it is being referred to now. Okay, this is the hard part. You did not put a comma after "Japan" and before "but." This screws up the sentence structure while also creating a run-on sentence. Lastly, we have no idea what the people in Tokyo are doing.

This is a better way to phrase that section as:

"One of my English teachers from the U.S. said he had never imagined that before he came to Japan, but every morning he saw people in Tokyo napping on the train next to him." (You can tell I added information onto the sentence, but it finishes it off well.)

I’ve never seen people sleeping on the train outside Japan. I wonder what you think when you see people sleeping on the train. I’ve read some foreign man called it “Japanese siesta”.

The first sentence is perfect. You should add "would" after "I wonder what you" to make more sense. "When" should definitely be changed to "if" because you would not know if the person you were speaking to would ever see someone asleep on the train. It could be some rare occurrence that it did not happen to them. Also, it is in past tence, so "see" is "saw." I think the problem with that sentence is that you thought it would be fine to write in present, yet past tense would be used instead usually if you were explaining a situation to someone. The last sentence needs just one change. "called" should be changed to "call" because of the situation.

I know what you are thinking now. What the heck is that? You said you would need to express the situations you were describing in past, then you changed it to present. English is just screwy like that.

So here:

"I've never seen people sleeping ont he train outside Japan. I wonder what you would think if you saw people sleeping on the train. I've read some foreign man call it 'Japanese siesta.'"

When I get on the underground train in New York, I tried to sleep out of habit, and then I reminded I wasn’t in Japan, opened my eyes quickly.
Do you sleep on the train in your country?

There is a bad run-on sentence here. I think for this one, I'll just type what I would've said. The last sentence is fine though.

"When I get on the underground train in New York, I try to sleep out of habit. That usually reminds me that I'm not in Japan, so I open my eyes quickly. Do you usually sleep on the train in your country?"

_______

I hope this confuses........errr......... helps you more.

P.S. If you were a girl sleeping on a bus in New York, you'd probably get snatched up and raped. Then again, that's just my southern stereotype of New York. XD