But I do mind pressing 1 for English. When I deal constantly with the fact that English is a minority language here in Miami, anything that reinforces this fact is very annoying. Even the Chinese employees in Chinese restaurants answer the phone in Spanish. Not only do the Chinese have to learn English, but they also have to learn to speak spanish to make up for the only culture in this country that I am aware of that refuses to merge with and blend with our culture instead of replacing it with their third world culture that didn't seem to work out for them in the first place.
One of my original sayings about life here in Miami: Despite what you have heard, you do not need to be bilingual to get a job in Miami. You just need to know Spanish.
Whoa! What happened? Sorry for the rant. The thread title sort of hit a nerve or something. Back to the signs please :)
But I do mind pressing 1 for English. When I deal constantly with the fact that English is a minority language here in Miami, anything that reinforces this fact is very annoying. Even the Chinese employees in Chinese restaurants answer the phone in Spanish. Not only do the Chinese have to learn English, but they also have to learn to speak spanish to make up for the only culture in this country that I am aware of that refuses to merge with and blend with our culture instead of replacing it with their third world culture that didn't seem to work out for them in the first place.
One of my original sayings about life here in Miami: Despite what you have heard, you do not need to be bilingual to get a job in Miami. You just need to know Spanish.
Sounds utterly dreadful for you. You need some 21st Century Mayflower going the other way it seems. Move to Devon dear boy, you've been a stranger in a strange land for far too long.
But I do mind pressing 1 for English. When I deal constantly with the fact that English is a minority language here in Miami, anything that reinforces this fact is very annoying. Even the Chinese employees in Chinese restaurants answer the phone in Spanish. Not only do the Chinese have to learn English, but they also have to learn to speak spanish to make up for the only culture in this country that I am aware of that refuses to merge with and blend with our culture instead of replacing it with their third world culture that didn't seem to work out for them in the first place.
One of my original sayings about life here in Miami: Despite what you have heard, you do not need to be bilingual to get a job in Miami. You just need to know Spanish.
Sounds utterly dreadful for you. You need some 21st Century Mayflower going the other way it seems. Move to Devon dear boy, you've been a stranger in a strange land for far too long.
I miss England. For three years I lived in the small town of Gayden which is just north of Banbury, southwest of Leamington Spa, south of Warwick, and southeast of Stratford Upon Avon (if I remember everything correctly).
Actually, in about two years (after my son goes to college) I'll move up north somewhere and join the remainder of the Americans in the U.S.
[quote=yakatme]...Sounds utterly dreadful for you. You need some 21st Century Mayflower going the other way it seems. Move to Devon dear boy, you've been a stranger in a strange land for far too long.
He would be better off moving to Canada...our language is closer to umerican than your english :O)
[quote=yakatme]...Sounds utterly dreadful for you. You need some 21st Century Mayflower going the other way it seems. Move to Devon dear boy, you've been a stranger in a strange land for far too long.
He would be better off moving to Canada...our language is closer to umerican than your english :O)
Ray
We've been infected - our spelling is becoming increasingly Americanised, phrases are beginning to be adopted that make absolutely no sense, even pronunciation is changing.
[quote=yakatme]...Sounds utterly dreadful for you. You need some 21st Century Mayflower going the other way it seems. Move to Devon dear boy, you've been a stranger in a strange land for far too long.
He would be better off moving to Canada...our language is closer to umerican than your english :O)
Ray
We've been infected - our spelling is becoming increasingly Americanised, phrases are beginning to be adopted that make absolutely no sense, even pronunciation is changing.
Word Virus. I learnt everything i need to know about english from Mrs Hamer- yr 6 and William Burroughs.
But I do mind pressing 1 for English. When I deal constantly with the fact that English is a minority language here in Miami, anything that reinforces this fact is very annoying. Even the Chinese employees in Chinese restaurants answer the phone in Spanish. Not only do the Chinese have to learn English, but they also have to learn to speak spanish to make up for the only culture in this country that I am aware of that refuses to merge with and blend with our culture instead of replacing it with their third world culture that didn't seem to work out for them in the first place.
One of my original sayings about life here in Miami: Despite what you have heard, you do not need to be bilingual to get a job in Miami. You just need to know Spanish.
Whoa! What happened? Sorry for the rant. The thread title sort of hit a nerve or something. Back to the signs please :)
I am quite happy for you all to learn Spanish or Chinese, then perhaps you will stop corrupting our language and spelling:))
But I do mind pressing 1 for English. When I deal constantly with the fact that English is a minority language here in Miami, anything that reinforces this fact is very annoying. Even the Chinese employees in Chinese restaurants answer the phone in Spanish. Not only do the Chinese have to learn English, but they also have to learn to speak spanish to make up for the only culture in this country that I am aware of that refuses to merge with and blend with our culture instead of replacing it with their third world culture that didn't seem to work out for them in the first place.
One of my original sayings about life here in Miami: Despite what you have heard, you do not need to be bilingual to get a job in Miami. You just need to know Spanish.
Sounds utterly dreadful for you. You need some 21st Century Mayflower going the other way it seems. Move to Devon dear boy, you've been a stranger in a strange land for far too long.
I miss England. For three years I lived in the small town of Gayden which is just north of Banbury, southwest of Leamington Spa, south of Warwick, and southeast of Stratford Upon Avon (if I remember everything correctly).
Actually, in about two years (after my son goes to college) I'll move up north somewhere and join the remainder of the Americans in the U.S.
Totally your fault for moving to the capitol of South America.... Everyone knows the US stops at Ft. Lauderdale.
For goodness sake be very careful about how you use the term twat outside of cockney circles - it really has got a quite different meaning to the one presented here....
For goodness sake be very careful about how you use the term twat outside of cockney circles - it really has got a quite different meaning to the one presented here....
I like John Stewart and Stephen Colbert, but to say this was anything but a thinly veiled anti-conservative gathering combined with a free comedy show and rock concert to get people to show up, is disingenuous at best.
I wasn't even born here and the fact that in Miami and wherever else in some other states, you have to know another language just to get a job or whatever else..it seems ridiculous, because...we (europeans, or you know...immigrants :) ) chose to come here, therefore we should learn english since that is what the language is spoken here.
And if some people chose not to learn it, that's fine, but don't make americans have to learn a different language...in America!! why? doesn't make sense...
Here in Chicago we have..polish neighborhoods, chinese neighborhoods, and so on...in those neighborhoods, all the restaurant names are written in their language and i see mostly of those people there. So...wasn't america supposed to be the melting pot or whatever the hell you call it? it seems like everyone is separated in their own little corner, so they dont' have to interact with anyone else or learn english...
Back to languages, I'm very deeply sad to see what's happening in Spain with spanish (castellano): in some regions they marginalize castellano.
And even if I understand well the reasons behind that, I can't agree. That doesn't mean that I want local folklore and minority languages to disappear.
Why the need to choose and exclude ??? It's easier to include.
My english is not as good as I would like (I'm still learning), even if I make mistakes I know that you understand me, I understand you, that's communication !
I could have written this in, let's say, Asturian language, less than half a million people are fluent in Asturian, that would have been quite stupid because my goal is to connect with you.
To have learnt different languages has given me the opportunity to be able to read (and enjoy) Umberto Eco in original version, to see "Spooks" (BBC serie, one of my fav series with Band of Brothers), to laugh with the jokes of this DPC thread, to seduce my husband reading French poems with my nice accent from Paris (France), to live in Spain and to be part of this community.
I'm NJ born and at 20 I went to school in Florida and stayed. I lived for 20 years in Orlando during which Spanish was added to all store signs and onto the election ballots and they now teach the spanish children in school in only spanish! They supposedly take English as well, but learn everything else in spanish... spanish became a requirement for most government jobs and an unavoidable requirement for private sector work that has consumers.
When I started working with my camera, I tried to do weddings, but more than half of my prospective clients were spanish that spoke no English. Without speaking spanish I lost all of those prospective jobs.
Clearly I had to learn spanish to continue to live in Florida. But, I didn't want to learn spanish, I always wanted to learn Dutch! And since I wanted to live in Holland, not in Florida, life made my hardest choice easier!
Oddly, here everyone speaks at least some English - unlike Florida, USA. Even so, I am also trying my best to learn Dutch, the language that the people speak in my new adopted land.
That thread title really does yank the chain of Floridians!
