I have been reading “Me talk pretty one day” by David Sedaris. Coincidentally enough-I am living in France at the moment-it was translated into “Je Parler Français” for the French market. If I could write a collection of short stories as a tribute to this book it would be “Me talk without an accent some day: My adventures on speaking every language I know with an accent.”
One chapter would take place at a nice Paris restaurant where the Spanish server claims I am a “gringa” because I am speaking in English to an English speaker! Never mind that I spoke back to him in Spanish or that that I look as Mexican as la Malinche (she was a famous native, a bad one, unlike me, but you get the idea). If Americans knew I was being called gringa they would expand the Minutema man program to Europe; any Latin looking person speaking English wold be deported back to their country in order to avert any confusion on who the real gringo is. It would be funny to see the shock in their faces when they have to deport me to nice and hip Canada.
The fact that I make grammatical and spelling mistakes, and have run-on sentences in this blog should automatically give me away as an ESL laureate.
Another chapter would take place in a too cool for school ad agency where a fellow Mexican also calls me a gringa because of a curious sounding “s” when I speak Spanish. Trust me, I am getting spared by no one, not even from Mexicans from my own city!!! Hmm, I was polite,but I think next time I see him I might practice some of my my bad sounding Mexican swear words on him. If anything I can tell him his comments encouraged me to improve my speech.
The saddest chapter will be the one where I come to the realisation that I speak French the way Jean Seberg did in Jean-Luc Godard’s Breathless, that is when true despair sets in…I do sound like a North American. (note I am not saying a certain other word). My only consolation would be the dream of becoming David Sedaris’s stagiere in Paris, and then maybe, I can talk funny one day too.
And with that said, and because I somehow imagined this to be a blog about fashion, I leave you with some style tips by David Sedaris.
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I have been reading “Me talk pretty one day” by David Sedaris. Coincidentally enough-I am living in France at the moment-it was translated into “Je Parler Français” for the French market. If I could write a collection of short stories as a tribute to this book it would be “Me talk without an accent some day: My adventures on speaking every language I know with an accent.”
One chapter would take place at a nice Paris restaurant where the Spanish server claims I am a “gringa” because I am speaking in English to an English speaker! Never mind that I spoke back to him in Spanish or that that I look as Mexican as la Malinche (she was a famous native, a bad one, unlike me, but you get the idea). If Americans knew I was being called gringa they would expand the Minutema man program to Europe; any Latin looking person speaking English wold be deported back to their country in order to avert any confusion on who the real gringo is. It would be funny to see the shock in their faces when they have to deport me to nice and hip Canada.
The fact that I make grammatical and spelling mistakes, and have run-on sentences in this blog should automatically give me away as an ESL laureate.
Another chapter would take place in a too cool for school ad agency where a fellow Mexican also calls me a gringa because of a curious sounding “s” when I speak Spanish. Trust me, I am getting spared by no one, not even from Mexicans from my own city!!! Hmm, I was polite,but I think next time I see him I might practice some of my my bad sounding Mexican swear words on him. If anything I can tell him his comments encouraged me to improve my speech.
The saddest chapter will be the one where I come to the realisation that I speak French the way Jean Seberg did in Jean-Luc Godard’s Breathless, that is when true despair sets in…I do sound like a North American. (note I am not saying a certain other word). My only consolation would be the dream of becoming David Sedaris’s stagiere in Paris, and then maybe, I can talk funny one day too.
And with that said, and because I somehow imagined this to be a blog about fashion, I leave you with some style tips by David Sedaris.
This entry was posted
on Tuesday, April 1st, 2008 at 7:33 am and is filed under Somethings.
You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.