Tue 2 May 2006
Am I truly bilingual myself?
Most people don’t realise that I’m not Australian when they first meet me. And that might be taken as a compliment on my English or the accent (or lack thereof) but every now and then I really give myself away and make a total fool of myself. I guess learning a second language isn’t all that easy after all.
There was the time, for example, that Michael and I were trying to organise to buy a house in Australia while we were still overseas. His parents really tried to help us out a lot and organised a lot of the nitty gritty for us. That was the word I was ment to say but out came: “It’s so good that you’re parents are going through the nipple gripple for us” (Michael had been telling me stories of his mates and him giving each other nipple gripples in college). Woopsy!
When bushwalking in Australia you’re bound to hear lots of different bird calls. Friends would say: “Can you hear the bower bird?” or “I think that was a bell bird.” Being me I didn’t realise that they were talking about two different bird calls, so the only way I could make sens of this was to call the bird bowel bird. Wonder what that one would sound like, though?
And the one time that I totally sent Michael into hysterical fits from laughing was when I said: “That’s Bonox!” But maybe vegetable stock is better than some crude swear word?!
I guess those Kookaburras in the photo would laugh pretty hard about me, and maybe I should do the same, but sometimes I just find it right out embarassing to look so dumb.
(Kookaburras are birds whose call sound like a real belly chuckle and you can hear them every day at dusk and dawn in Australia if you life anywhere near the bush. They certainly always make me laugh.)
May 2nd, 2006 at 11:28 pm
I’m sure Mick’s friends were giving each other nipple ‘C’ripples, not gripples
May 2nd, 2006 at 11:41 pm
Apperently both words are in use and as far as I could see refer to the same thing.
Check out Dictionary of Playground Slang
May 3rd, 2006 at 5:09 pm
Hi, Franny, that was a delightful blog, and I just wanted to say you should never feel silly or embarrassed if you use a wrong word or term - always remember most of us Aussies are not multi-lingual like you so we are the last ones who should be critical of any little mistakes. It’s great that you can laugh at yourself (which is quite an Aussie thing to do) so good for you! Love from Grandma
May 4th, 2006 at 10:05 am
Thanks Lorna!
I’m not too hung up about it, and I guess those examples are the rather funny ones.
But sometimes I say tings and Michael might point out afterwards that whatever I said could easily be misunderstood to be pretty rude. And that’s not realy the desired effect.
But anyway I’m muddling through. Thanks for understanding, though!!
May 5th, 2006 at 12:33 pm
I use wrong words in English all the time. I think most people do. When I speak German I probably get more words wrong than I get right at times!
May 8th, 2006 at 1:33 pm
Thanks for the encouragement, Mr Haddock!
I’m making more and more mistakes in German as well, which sometimes makes me wonder whether there’s such a thing as true bilingualism. Whether it’s actually possible to speak two languages absolutely fluently without mistakes. I find the more I get immersed in English the more mistakes I make in German and if I then in turn have quite a bit of German exposure again (reading a German book or watching more German DVDs) I make more mistakes in English.
June 27th, 2006 at 1:12 am
Hi Franzie, I’m just going to jump right in here… I know what it’s like to be bi-lingual, tri-lingual. As an american who married a german and lived in Germany for 28 years, I find myself constantly searching for the right words
Now that I’m back in the USA, I’m hoping to get my english back, but on the same note, afraid my german knowledge will diminish. Exposure to german DVD’s is a good idea, in fact, that is how I was able to enforce the english language to my 3 children while they were growing up in Germany, by watching english video cassettes (that’s what we had back in the 80’s)
BTW, I really enjoy reading your blogs… and I can really relate to alot of the things you write, and find your experience of Aussie Land sooooo interesting. I have always wanted to visit Australia, and stay for a few months to really get the ‘real’ true feeling of what it’s really like to live there.
liebe Gruesse! Aldi
July 12th, 2006 at 10:09 pm
Hi Aldi,
so I should be able to be a little more responsive now.
thanks for visiting my blog and sorry for not getting back to you for such a jolly long time but life has been pretty crazy for us lately.
My eldest daughter broker her arm, then I was in bed with some gastro-bug for the better part of one week and then the holidays started and we did some renovations and went away for a few days straight after that. But everything is back to normal now (well M’s arm is still in a cast, but she’s suffering pretty well with it
Yes, it seems so strange to me sometimes that we talk of bilingual people when really one language will always suffer and get weaker and weaker if you don’t work really hard on it. So there’s not really such a thing as “being” bilingual but it’s a conscious effort.
You wrote “tri-lingual” which other languages do you speak?
July 13th, 2006 at 3:25 am
Sorry to hear about M’s breakage
Hope she feels better…. and Gute Besserung
How much longer does the cast have to stay on?
Our other language is Lithuanian, which is the language that really has suffered…. my children only know a few words and phrases. I still understand it fluently, just never mastered speaking it…. it’s more complicated than learning german, that’s for sure!
August 7th, 2006 at 9:21 pm
Wow, Lithuanian. I imagine, it’d be even harder to get resources for Lithuanian and I guess the only way to really speak and understand a language is usage and emersion in it, which would be pretty hard when you don’t live in the specific country or have access to people who speak the language really well.