"Living with 60 Million Foreigners", Monthly Talk 15/02/21(Mon)

Historical Society welcomed – insofar as “welcoming” is possible in these times – Christina Spencer for our February talk. The blog administrators were a few minutes late due to a combination of technical issues and looking after Historical Society’s youngest member (born in November 2020) and would like to take this opportunity to apologise for not being able to transcribe the whole talk.

As part of her work with the German Foreign Office, Mrs Spencer would often work as an interpreter for the police. The police make sure to employ competent professionals, but some companies cut corners when it comes to language services and this can have amusing results. Mrs Spencer gave some examples. Firstly, when Vauxhall developed the Nova, it was launched at an exhibition in Spain. The opinion was that the car would perform poorly in Spanish-speaking markets – “no va” being the Spanish for “doesn’t go”. Secondly, when the German pharmaceutical company Bayer wanted to market some headache tablets in the United Arab Emirates, they were very careful to use only images and were then puzzled that the campaign was so badly received. Bayer had forgotten that Arabic reads from right to left, meaning that local consumers took the advert as saying that a happy-looking lady took the tablets and then looked really ill. Thirdly, a gentleman was once addressing a conference in Russia and had taken the trouble to learn the Russian for “hello”. Upon arrival, he realised that he hadn’t learnt the Russian for “ladies and gentlemen”, so he asked one of the hotel staff to read what was written above the toilets. The conference attendees were amused to be addressed as “latrines and urinals”.

There are many aspects of life in the UK which are confusing to those who grew up elsewhere, even when these people have an excellent grasp of the English language. Some of the confusion is caused by the distinction between British and English – although the vast majority of British people speak English as a first language, not all these people are English and the Scots, Welsh and Northern Irish will be quick to point it out. Although Britain made the transition to decimal currency in 1971 (almost precisely 50 years before the talk, in fact), other units of measurement remain in common use in the UK which are not so widely understood elsewhere. An example is giving temperatures in degrees Fahrenheit – Mrs Spencer finds this particularly amusing given that Gabriel Fahrenheit was, in fact, German.

Certain elements of UK life seem almost deliberately designed to baffle. When thinking about schools for her children, Mrs Spencer in the first instance assumed they would go to a public school, before finding out that here in England, public schools are private. Given that her children were special, she then considered a special school, not realising that this referred specifically to pupils with special educational needs. When she saw that there was such a thing as an approved school, Mrs Spencer hoped that her husband would consider this sort of establishment – until she learnt that approved schools are corrective institutions for young offenders.

The British are prone to understatement. Mrs Spencer remembered the hurricane of 1987 (which caused 22 deaths and many, many injuries) being described as “a bit blowy”. A crucial element of British humour is that when a misfortune befalls an individual, that same individual will often find the event very amusing. Tea if offered should always be accepted and the weather is an endlessly interesting topic of conversation.

The English language is rich in examples of signs and headlines with the potential to be read in multiple ways with very different meanings. Mrs Spencer shared some instances with us, including:

- “comprehensive school drop-outs cut in half”
- “all meat in this shop is from local farmers killed on premises”
- “toilet out of order, please use floor below”
- from a private medical firm offering keyhole surgery: “we operate on your doorstep”

Mrs Spencer also recounted the time she was particular to get the mince for her mince pies fresh from the butcher, not out of a tin. She nevertheless congratulated her mostly British audience for speaking the world’s only truly global language, however illogical it may be.

28 devices tuned in to the meeting and many of these devices were being used by two or more people. One of the meeting attendees was raised in St Helens, but currently lives in Poland. The British are unusual for taking milk in their tea; our attendee from Poland informed us that there, milk in tea is a tuberculosis treatment and some concern was caused when the addition of milk was requested.