Wednesday, April 23, 2008

words are my life!

there is nothing i find more endearing than funny english-is-not-my-first-language sentence constructions. and i feel like i can say this without being patronizing or judgmental, as i have spent a fair share of my life living in places where the language spoken by everyone else was not spoken by me. or at least not spoken well. i could go on for ages about my own linguistic foibles (trying to teach an english class in japan while accidentally speaking spanish is top of the list), but i would prefer to go on about other people's adorable mis-speaks instead. the parties involved in this exchange will remain anonymous, but here is one of my recent favorites. (pay particularly close attention to the punctuation. this is an exact reproduction):

"How are you doing? I hope you are doing well!. Although you move to other place. I would like to keeping in touch with you and might go out and take an ice cream or dinner together or go to see a movie at the move theater or spend time doing what you feel like to do for fun. How this sound to you?. I wonder and ponder the possibility to do so..."

i know. for cute.

some others i love...

one of my english students from my time as a missionary in japan gave me a letter on the last day of class that said, "i thank you from the heart of my bottom. i very much enjoy at jesus christ english school." (i choose not to see this as a reflection of my skills as an english teacher.)

one time the man at the framing shop in our neighborhood in spain asked my mom if she wanted him to put a recently framed picture in her car. she declined because she had walked. but really she said, "i am a foot." literally.

one time my dad was in a meeting in south america and said, in spanish, "i just need to get my coat." the verb he used means "to get" in spain spanish, but means something really different in south american spanish. let's just say, you can't do that to a coat.

one time someone i knew on the mission (it might have been the branch president) asked me about dating. i told him that, before the mission, i had enjoyed living with lots of different boys. i don't know what i was trying to say, but it wasn't that.

my most recent language-related slip-up didn't involve speaking, but a movie i had rented from the red box (my one true love) called "paris j'taime." as the title suggests, the movie is french. but for some reason i was just sure the characters were going to start speaking english at any moment. i watched 45 minutes of unintelligible action before i finally started over with english subtitles.

anyone else have a good one to share?

6 comments:

Marcelina Moreno said...

please see my blog posting http://marceyinslc.blogspot.com/2007/12/its-better-to-be-single-and-happyright.html
I believe that this might also address this issue. Misty and I say to one another "that would be could" and it still cracks us up. Enjoy!

Marcelina Moreno said...

http://marceyinslc.blogspot.com/
2007/12/its-
better-to-
be-single-and-happyright.html

okay who looks like an idiot now??

PNRBAC said...

Reading your blog is TRUE ENTERTAINMENT! So when are you going to write a book?...
Nan

lenalou said...

This post should come with a public health warning. I choked on my drink laughing. I could have died.

Marie said...

Estoy embarazada.

I'm sure I've said a whole slew of hilarious things in my years battling Spanish and Arabic, but my kindly teachers never burst out laughing, at least not while I was still in the room.

Oh, I remember one. I was transliterating patrons' names into Arabic at BYU's Ottoman exhibit a few years back and this very dignified elderly Palestinian gentleman in a kafiyeh walked up to my table and greeted me in Arabic (can't blame him for thinking I was fluent, given what I was doing at the time). I panicked and completely forgot the formal register, and essentially said to him, "Heya, dude, how's it goin'?"

Our encounter was very brief indeed.

frances said...

marie, "estoy embarazada" is one of my most favorite! especially when a sister missionary says it from the pulpit, and follows it with, "and it's all the bishop's fault." ah, perfection.