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| Korean VS English"I know that John McCain will do that and I, as his vice president,
families we are blessed with that vote of the American people and are
elected to serve and are sworn in on January 20, that will be our top
priority is to defend the American people."
-- Sarah Palin, during an interview with Charles Gibson
This potential candidate for the President of U.S.A. has done the finest job I have ever seen of consistently butchering her native language, and while I can't help but mention the fact that as a result Americans have lost a great deal of footing in their mockery of "Engrish" in Korea, I think there is a useful lesson to be learned here by all sides. Sarah Palin is not mentally retarded. I mean, she got to where she is because in certain political respects she is very able and effective at what she does. Not to mention she has been a public figure whether as a mayor of a small town or the governor of Alaska, so at the very least she's had several years of real-life practice in speaking in front of an audience.
But, in all honesty, I have never seen a single Korean holder of office consistently mangle the usage of his or her mother tongue to such a severe extent.
Isn't this prima facie evidence for the hypothesis claiming that English is a relatively difficult language to master?
So please, if any expat teachers are out there reading, have a little sympathy when you come across the next bit of Engrish you feel tempted to laugh at.
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| Please do not hesitate to point out that this is rubbishFor some reason or another, I am hesitant these days to initiate "how are you doing" conversations with friends and acquaintances. The problem seems to be that in the back of my mind, there is always an underlying motive of wanting to look good in front of these people, and that it's mostly without justification. I mean, it's bad enough when you show off or try to look decent even if you really are a decent or naturally outgoing person, but what about when you have inside knowledge -- perhaps exaggerated, I don't know -- into the multi-faceted and numerous run-ins against what we call a standard of normal, decent character? Some of these offenses may be so severe as to warrant physical punishment in a bygone era, who knows, or if Jesus had not shed blood, may have caused an immediate falling to the ground and reckoning with the Ultimate Judge. Given this, when there is even the smallest possibility that you are initiating the interaction in your own self-interest with people who owe you absolutely nothing, can you really blame me for being hesitant about the process?
In contrast, interacting with family seems much easier in this sense, because with them you are at a minimal level protected by the sense of duty which envelopes all the members. There is no question here of one person trying to unjustly take advantage of another from a clean slate environment where nobody owes anybody anything. Because within the confines of your immediate family, the feeling seems to be that the members are born with debt to be repaid to one another.
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| Funny feelingI may be writing about something not worth writing about but I have to say one of the weirdest feelings I've experienced as a minority American -- in particular, as an Asian -- was when I went out to Manhattan for a rare viewing of a popular musical, and after having felt out of place for my entire life as the lone Asian among the privileged Whites and Blacks who claim American-ness with every right and fervor, you come across these white folks who are clearly just foreign. This is one of those rare moments when I really feel myself to be American and not anything else, and that is something really special for me. They speak their out of place languages, be it french, spanish, italian or whatever, and what is my first gut reaction?
Friggin Forrreigners.
There you have it. True blue American.
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| Just Imagine"Just imagine what a trillion-dollar investment would return to the economy...if we committed at that level to green jobs and technologies.” In today's Tom Friedman column. | | |
| Possibly the biggest spin put on the massive fuckup created by so called financial wizardsPeter Bernstein, whoever the heck he is, contributes the following to the NYTimes with a totally straight face
"There was a time, in my childhood during the Great Depression, when the streets of Manhattan were filled with unshaven men in threadbare clothes, their coat collars turned up against the cold, their shoes stuffed with newspaper to plug holes in the soles. And there were bank failures.
A huge bailout plan is being hammered out in Washington precisely to avert this kind of economic calamity."
In today's interconnected world economy, where Americans can make a pretty decent living overseas just by talking in their own native language, you mean to seriously tell me that people will go hungry if we don't bail out these mofos who already have their multi-million dollar retirement funds safely tucked away?
Leave my thousands of tax dollars alone. I'll take my chances with the grittiness and survival ability of average Americans.
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