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I'm trying to translate the following sentence from a book and I'm confused by
its construction.

> 牛乳を飲み終わった人から、紙パックを自分の番号のケースに戻して席に着くように。

Which I assume would mean _"When people finish drinking their milk, they
usually put back the card box in their own case."_ A bit confusing already but
this is the best I can manage, might already be wrong though.

However my biggest problem right now is making sense of 着くように in this
sentence. I understand that ように means _in order to_ or _as if_ but I fail to
see how it could connect to 着く and the rest of the sentence. Could it mean
something like _"[the narrator] went as if putting back their box like people
usually do when they're done drinking their milk"_ or am I completely off
track here?

Help would be appreciated thank you!

PS: If you're wondering, this is the very first sentence of a book called 告白
by 湊かなえ and I have no idea what it's _actually_ about.
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2017-03-21T12:21:24.903
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translation usage
Translation difficulties and the meaning of 着くように
席に着く means to take a seat so this would be "When you've finished drinking your
milk, put it back in your numbered case and sit down"
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2017-03-21T13:03:17.700
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In this context,

> 「着{つ}くように」＝「着くようにしなさい」

In other words, this whole sentence is an **_imperative_** , which is why your
translation " **When people finish drinking their milk, they usually ~~~~** "
is highly inaccurate. Sorry for being blunt, but I've gotta tell the truth so
you could learn something.

The ように-imperative is quite common in giving instructions, but you would need
to remember that you should not use it to speak to people of higher status. In
that case, 「～～ようにしてください」 or 「～～ようにお願{ねが}いします」 would be used instead.

> "As you finish drinking the milk, take turns in putting back the (empty)
> paper packs in your (assigned) case and then, go back to your seat."

Finally, when a phrase/sentence ends in 「 **Verb in Dictionary Form + ように** 」,
it can mean another thing " **so that (verb phrase)** ".

Whether it means that or it is used as an imperative depends entirely on the
context. If I said:

> 「神社で祈った。あの人と結婚できるように。」,

it would have to mean:

> "I prayed at the shrine so that I could marry that girl."

It should **_not_** mean:

> "I prayed at the shrine. Be able to marry that girl!"
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2017-03-21T13:04:55.200
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着くように is a shortened form of 着くようにして下さい, which can be translated as "Make sure
that you xxx xxx".
CC BY-SA 3.0
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