A Challenge For Italki Members Who Are Studying Japanese. #3 The following paragraph is a quote from an entrance-exam to an university in Japan. The applicants are supposed to translate it into correct / natural sounding English without sacrificing the meanings and nuances of the original Japanese sentences. Could you, as an English native speaker, try to do that for us? As English learners, we want to learn English by reading various compositions and comparing them to the original Japanese text. Note that these Japanese sentences are not as easy to comprehend as they may ostensibly appear. == 学生時代に、一人だけでよいから外国人の親しい友人を持ちなさい、と言いたい。　そうした友人がいないということ自体が、世界の尺度に当てはめてみれば、きわめて異常なことだ。　これも日本が永年、世界から隔絶された、閉鎖的な社会であったからである。 ==