Wednesday, October 11, 2006

Mind Your Language!

Look! Here's an extract I received from a Dutch video-training manual for those inbuggering courses where foreigners are forced to learn Dutch! It's intended to familiarise the Dutch teachers about all the weirdo foreigners they're going to have to deal with! See it here.

Ok, ok - I made it all up. It's actually the opening sequence from a 1970s British sitcom. Does anyone remember this TV show? It was about foreign students learning English and was truly woeful, relying on all kinds of national stereotypes for humour. So the Italian guy was always saying "Mamma Mia!" and the Indian guy was always saying "goodness gracious me" etc. Actually, it would probably go down a treat in Holland in 2006; maybe as part of a Mr Bean double bill special?

Anyhow, I was reminded of the show when attending a conference last week. There was a bunch of us there from all over the place, and English was the common language in which most people conversed when not speaking with someone else who spoke their native tongue.

Now the Dutch speak good English and, typically, learn it from the age of 4 or 5 at school. They have a greater fluency and several years of practice more than, say, your average Pole or Hungarian. So it was interesting to compare the different ways in which people expressed themselves in English; in particular, how the Dutch people's choice of words and style revealed their underlying personality traits and character.

In conversation with non-Dutchies, when you ventured an opinion or view about something with which the other person disagreed, they'd usually say something like "Really? Do you think so?" Or "Why do you think that?" or "I have a different view" or "My view is that....". That kind of thing; basically a way in which you can have a good exchange of views, but keep the conversation moving along nicely.

Except for our Dutch friends. "No, no, no, no, no, no - I am 100% certain that I am absolutely right. In fact I am sure of it." This was the riposte I received 15 seconds into my first conversation with a Dutchie. What were we debating? It wasn't some incontrovertible fact, like what's the capital of Bolivia?; or some conjecture, like who will win the F.A. Cup?, but rather the name of someone we both (allegedly) knew in common; who I had hired at my previous company; known for 7 years; and had spoken to the day before, in person. In contrast, the Dutchie thought he may have worked with her a couple of years ago, but, nevertheless, based on his logic, I had somewhat embarrassingly been calling her by the wrong name for 7 years.

I decided to change the subject and talk about Prague (where the conference was located). I said 'such a beautiful city' (which it is), or some other small-talk-conference-speak thing like that, to which his reply was "I took some photographs earlier around the place - very disappointing, because normally all of the photographs I take are amazing. Even if the subject is not very good!"

Our scintillating conversation then moved on to talking about the conference itself. I asked him had he attended in previous years? No, first time for him - as it was for me. So I said that I thought this was the third year the conference had been run? He waved his hand in my face and said "no, you are quite mistaken. I know for a fact that this is the fourth year! In fact, I am sure of it!"

So I had some fun with him for a while by saying things like 'I thought Amsterdam was in Germany?' and 'don't you think that the Dutch language will cease to exist in 3 or 4 years', but to be honest with you, it was diminishing returns sense-of-humour-wise - ie, he didn't have one.

It was time to dump him on some other unfortunate in the room. I saw a couple of other people who I knew and so asked if he knew them? "I have absolutely no idea who they are. I've never met them in my life before!" Er... a simple, 'no, but it would be lovely to meet them' would have done it. With that, I said, "you know, I think I left the iron on in my room, I better go check"". I didn't bother to wait to hear the "no, no, no, no, no you are quite mistaken!"

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

haha, i am working with a lot of dutchies and have to say that the "stubborness" of them can be somewhat tiring when debating things at work.

but i have learned/am learning to be tough and rough and simply rolling over them when necessary. not a nice guy, but hey I got my responsibilites too. But in reality this is tiring in the long run.

But it is a good example of how you can take a dutchie out of lowland, but not lowland out of a dutchie.

but in the end, I guess we are all children of our cultural context.

I am swedish. Ie afraid of conflicts...

Anonymous said...

So you base you whole oppinion on 1 coversation: is it not you too who does the same thing as the dutchie: you are sure dutch people are like this because you have meet 1 person who is like this. Fotr you there is also no discussion about it.
You know you are right! (and just the same as the dutchie you take as a example)...

Greetings,
Kepjapislekker

Anonymous said...

So you base you whole oppinion on 1 coversation: is it not you too who does the same thing as the dutchie: you are sure dutch people are like this because you have meet 1 person who is like this. Fotr you there is also no discussion about it.
You know you are right! (and just the same as the dutchie you take as a example)...

Greetings,
Ketjapislekker