Sado Island, this week

Charles Jenkins, former U.S. soldier and North Korea abductee, has confirmed widespread expectations that he is planning to commit his memoirs to paper. Jenkins, wife of Hitomi Soga, spent more than 30 years in the communist republic, and intends to talk about his experinces and tribulations as a prisoner of the oppressive regime.

In order to bring his English up to a standard capable of expressing an autobiographical treatise, Jenkins has been attending English classes on the desolate island of Sado, along with several local children. Jenkins takes a twice-weekly lesson at Mrs. Murakami's Eigo Kyoushitsu, where he is joined by Ayana Kanayama, 5, Natsumi Kanayama, 7, and Takuma Yamagishi, 7.

After several months of study, Jenkins had mastered enough of his native language to start spelling three-letter words, such as "bat", "cat" and "hat". Recently, he was pleased to have moved up a level, managing to spell longer words such as "ball", "tall" and "book".

Speaking through his husband, Hitomi, Jenkins said that he was pleased to announce that he could finally write "book", and that this was an important step to being able to communicate his story through the medium of language.
"If I can write 'book' today, then next week I'll be moving up to 'cook', the week after to 'rabbit', and pretty soon Mrs Murakami says I can do 'plurals', whatever them are."

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