Unofficial Christ's Hospital Forum

TBA did the Hash Key trick yesterday Lunch time
It is now our standard practice ---

In a trade magazine I have recently received there was a full page advert from the Fiji department of commerce advertising their capability to host 24/7 call centres with primarily English Language services, but also multi-language facilities. I have no interest, but was wondering if they would provide a research visit for me.........

J.R. wrote:Speaky-No Inglish ? Then I no speaky !!

I admit that I have been known to answer in a foreign language so they then repeat themselves ad infinitum. After a few "não entendo"s I simply go and get a mug of tea.

That's a good one, David! Reminds me of a case zillions of years ago when my mum was a passenger in a car driven by a friend (English), who had spent time in the diplomatic service in Kenya. The car was pulled over for speeding. The driver hissed to my mum 'keep your mouth shut', and when she smilingly wound down the window to speak to the police officer, she spoke in (?) Swahili. He persised in English, she persisted in the foreign language, until he stood back, said 'bl**dy Foreigners', and gestured her on her way. This was in Worthing, West Sussex.....in about 1958.

I am told that it works well with Finnish too - especially as the chances of finding a Finnish speaker in the UK are comparatively slim. My son-in-law once avoided what would have been a legitimate imposition of points on his driving licence for speeding, simply because he held only a European licence and apparently the authorities could not put points on it!! I suspect it may have made him less careful afterwards about obeying traffic laws. On one occasion I was a passenger in his car and noticed that he was not wearing a selt belt; I reminded him that the law had just changed to include a hefty fine and he said 'If they stop me, I shall just speak Finnish!' - and I thought he was such a nice law-abiding young man!!

kerrensimmonds wrote:

That's a good one, David! Reminds me of a case zillions of years ago when my mum was a passenger in a car driven by a friend (English), who had spent time in the diplomatic service in Kenya. The car was pulled over for speeding. The driver hissed to my mum 'keep your mouth shut', and when she smilingly wound down the window to speak to the police officer, she spoke in (?) Swahili. He persised in English, she persisted in the foreign language, until he stood back, said 'bl**dy Foreigners', and gestured her on her way. This was in Worthing, West Sussex.....in about 1958.

Wouldn't work today.

Our beloved 'plod' have immediate access by phone to translators.

J.R. wrote:

kerrensimmonds wrote:

That's a good one, David! Reminds me of a case zillions of years ago when my mum was a passenger in a car driven by a friend (English), who had spent time in the diplomatic service in Kenya. The car was pulled over for speeding. The driver hissed to my mum 'keep your mouth shut', and when she smilingly wound down the window to speak to the police officer, she spoke in (?) Swahili. He persised in English, she persisted in the foreign language, until he stood back, said 'bl**dy Foreigners', and gestured her on her way. This was in Worthing, West Sussex.....in about 1958.

Wouldn't work today.

Our beloved 'plod' have immediate access by phone to translators.

A friend, born and raised in the US is a French national by blood, education (a "grande école" in Paris) and passport but carries a New York driving licence and imported his car with USA plates. This was many years back when, stopped by the Gendarmerie for exceeding the speed limit between Marseilles and Paris, he claimed not to speak French. Quite simple - the French police carried a book of phrases in many languages so he still got fined for speeding. How he got away with it I will never know - he has a French title and umpteen "de"s and "le"s in his name.

France has a slight problem with UK driving licences. The French award points just as we do but more minor offences also gather points. Appeal is either not allowed or perhaps simply impracticable - if a gendarme says you have broken the law then that is it. There was an agreement whereby points awarded by the French would be put on British licences by Cardiff but this was cancelled by the UK because of the lack of appeal procedure. A friend was caught only slowing down at a Stop sign and showed his UK licence so they demanded that he go to Carcassonne and get a French licence for them to endorse the points on. (It's a simple procedure based on the UK licence).

As for my Portuguese, most of the calls seem to come from Indians (or perhaps Pakistanis). If I did get caught out I could always throw a bit of something else into the equation; it happened just once at a family party when a Dane tried it on me and we went through quite a few languages until he stumped me with Africaans.

J.R. wrote: Wouldn't work today.
Our beloved 'plod' have immediate access by phone to translators.

Not necessarily much use.
In Norwegian there are two major strains of the language with grammar differences (2 genders in one, 3 in the other), differences in common words (syve = sjue = 7) and dialects almost unintelligible from one side of the mountain to the other. On top of that Sami or Lapp (an order of magnitude harder than Finnish) is also an official language.
In France a few of my neighbours speak Occitan and seem not to understand French and up the Cerdanya up in the mountains Catalan is used. Just try Geraint (Vier Bliu)'s Jersiaise on them!
As for South American Portuguese - the differences are mindboggling. In the south one third of the words are pure hoch deutsche, you get Amerindian thrown in and, as an example, my boss from São Paulo claimed not to understand my Carioca - 250 miles between the towns, way different words, grammer, pronunciation .... When I learned Portuguese I had to specify the town involved out of perhaps a dozen alternatives.

One could have all sorts of fun with Mr Plod's telephone translator!

I believe that Finnish is ONLY related to one other language ----- to wit -- Hungarian.

Attila the Hun arrived in Western Europe with two sons, the elder BUDA, founded the ciry of the same name, twinned, onthe other side of the Danube with Pest,
The other son (Name unknown) went North to what is now Finland, hence the similarity of lamguage.

This seems plausible, but perhaps we will get confirmation, or denial from Finland !!

As to speaking Swahili -- the policeman might have served in the East African Police Force -- and would have replied in kind !

I speak reasonably fluent German, having been taught at CH in 1940 --- seemed a good idea at the time !!!

I also speak Italian, but with a Sicilian accent ----- thanks to a girl named Graziella, ------- Don't ask !!!!!!!

Hey, we've done all this before! See the 'Anyone in Finland?' thread on the Overseas and Travelling bit! Incidentally we seem to have strayed a long way from Windows scams!

NEILL THE NOTORIOUS wrote:I believe that Finnish is ONLY related to one other language ----- to wit -- Hungarian.

Attila the Hun arrived in Western Europe with two sons, the elder BUDA, founded the ciry of the same name, twinned, onthe other side of the Danube with Pest,
The other son (Name unknown) went North to what is now Finland, hence the similarity of lamguage.

This seems plausible, but perhaps we will get confirmation, or denial from Finland !!

As to speaking Swahili -- the policeman might have served in the East African Police Force -- and would have replied in kind !

I speak reasonably fluent German, having been taught at CH in 1940 --- seemed a good idea at the time !!!

I also speak Italian, but with a Sicilian accent ----- thanks to a girl named Graziella, ------- Don't ask !!!!!!!

'Me'a speaka' Mafiosa !!'

She had two brothers --- with double -breasted suits and long sideboards ----

I always assumed they were Mafiosi

Fortunately, I was posted from Tripoli to Khartoum, which I assume would avoid a "Shotgun Wedding" due to distance travel for the "Guests" !

NEILL THE NOTORIOUS wrote:She had two brothers --- with double -breasted suits and long sideboards ----

I always assumed they were Mafiosi

Fortunately, I was posted from Tripoli to Khartoum, which I assume would avoid a "Shotgun Wedding" due to distance travel for the "Guests" !

They lived in large houses, then ?

Fjgrogan wrote:I am told that it works well with Finnish too - especially as the chances of finding a Finnish speaker in the UK are comparatively slim. My son-in-law once avoided what would have been a legitimate imposition of points on his driving licence for speeding, simply because he held only a European licence and apparently the authorities could not put points on it!! I suspect it may have made him less careful afterwards about obeying traffic laws. On one occasion I was a passenger in his car and noticed that he was not wearing a selt belt; I reminded him that the law had just changed to include a hefty fine and he said 'If they stop me, I shall just speak Finnish!' - and I thought he was such a nice law-abiding young man!!

Last weekend there were 6 police cars (probably the entire local force) parked outside our local equivalent of 7-11 (SIWA). We summised they were doing spot checks for winter tires and changed lanes and after we had driven past, my husband... the above-mentioned, put on his seat belt!!



I have a Finnish name so people calling me don't expect an English voice... very handy when getting rid of sales calls! "Do you speak English? No? Sorry - me no speaky da finnish"