Wednesday, September 27, 2006

Guffaws in other languages

Working in both English and French has offered me plenty of learning opportunities, see the following examples:

Earlier this week I learned how to put a mob hit on somebody in French "Je vais engagé quel-qu'un, et mettre un contract sur la tête de ..."

Two weeks ago I acidentally told someone that a counsellor has a Mistress (Maitress) in Social Work as opposed to a Master's (Maitrise) in Social work.

Just this morning I succumbed to slang use and told someone that I sometimes deal (dealé) with high risk situations. Please note that this is actual slang used in Quebec - they do that to the F-Word as well as in F---é. (Although this use is not considered as profane as other terms used in French - and magically not confused with Seals)

But I think the Piece de Resistance for me was not in speaking French at work but actually Arabic to my family, where I confused the terms Sick (E-it) and Naked (Er-it). I told my aunts and cousins that "my Mom got very naked after eating some uncooked salad vegetables on her last trip to Egypt".

Thankfully, I manage to always be understood, even if it is with a chuckle!

2 comments:

ghanima said...

What I find hilarious is that you neglected to use French punctuation on "Piece de Resistance". :)

MiraFabulous said...

I was anglo-sizing it :)