July 14, 2008 9:54 AM
So You Think You Can Speak English?: Yes. Okay.
I am helpless. I am powerless. I can barely use the semi-phonetical pronunciation guide in the back of one of my Beijing travel books (I haven't gotten a handle on the four tones for each character yet).Such are my thoughts on a typical day here, living as a non-Mandarin speaker. In day-to-day situations, without a translator nearby, I'm basically at the whim of English-speaking hotel front desk employees around town to help me get by.
The only thing that's slightly reassuring in these situations is that there are thousands of people around town like me, surviving by pointing and nodding.
Now, I hadn't been a true third party to the ridiculousness of a conversation between an English speaker and a quasi-English speaker until Friday, when on a BOCOG-sponsored media tour, I witnessed the following scene. Your key players: a translator, two journalists from state-sponsored CCTV and an American university professor. The text:
Translator: Hi, these are reporters from China's CCTV.
Professor [to journalists] : Hello. Do you speak English?
[Journalists give blank stare. Translator says something in Chinese to one of the journalists, and he responds.]
Translator: He says he speaks English.
[Professor -- ignoring the irony of the previous sentence -- begins minute-long spiel about how nice it is to have CCTV along for the ride.]
Journalist [after an extended pause, though still with blank stare]: Yes. Okay.
[Conversation continues as such for about a minute before the professor notices that the journalist is responding with "Yes. Okay." to everything.]
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