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M O R E S T U F F
A famous writer who was vistiting Japan was invited to
have a lecture at a university to a large group of students. As most of them
could not understand spoken English, he had to have an interpreter.
During his lecture he told an amusing story which went on for rather a long
time. at last he stopped to allow the interpreter to translate it into
Japanese, and was very surprised when the man did this in a few seconds,
after which all the students laughed loudly.
After the lecture, the writer thanked the interprter for his good work and
then said to him, "Now please tell me how you translated that long story of
mine into such a short Japanese one."
"I didn't tell the story at all," the interpreter anwered with a smile. "I
just said, "The honourable lecturer has just told a funny story. You will
all laugh, please."
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T H E E N G L I S H L A N G U A G E : Some People Just Don't Get It
The English language is basically fairly simple.
Oh, of course, it has some peculiarities. You can read all about these
idiosyncracies on various internet web sites. We've all seen the cute e-mail
forwards about the language ... about how a "slim chance" and a "fat chance"
are the same thing, but a "wise man" and a "wise guy" are opposites. And
we've all wondered why you drive on a parkway but park on a driveway.
But most of us who grew up with the language understand these little tricks
of syntax. And we adapt well and understand what we mean when we use certain
phrases and expressions.
MOST of us.
There are certainly exceptions. And most of those exceptions happen to be
patients of mine, for some reason. For some reasons, people who are
incapable of understanding simple, plain, street English seem to gravitate
toward my office. Why that is, I don't know.
Consider the following exchange:
"Can you read this line?"
"F ... Z ... B ... D ... 4"
"Ok, very good. Now tell me which looks better. Number One or Number Two?"
"F ... Z ... B ... D ... 4"
"Yes, we've established that you can READ the line. Now, can you tell me if one of these lenses looks BETTER to you than the other one? Here's number ONE again....... and here's number TWO. Which is BETTER?"
"F ... Z ... B ... D ... 4"
"I see you majored in linguistic studies at the University of Arkansas before moving here, is that right?"
"I think I can read some of the letters on the next line..... O ... F ... L ... "
"Never mind that. Let's dilate your eyes today. I'm going to put a couple of
eye drops in......oops, did that bottle say 'hydrogen peroxide'? I'll bet
that REALLY stings. Maybe I should brush up on my English skills."
U P D A T E
After reading this page, I received an email from "Cindy," a former optometric technician who relayed the following story:
There was this guy who said, "I'm here to see the doctor about my rectum. He
took some picture of my rectum and he's gonna talk to me about 'em."
Of course, he meant retina! It seems that very intelligent man had incurred some retinal damage in the past from staring at the sun. Go figure.
Either he meant to say "retina" or he and that eye doctor had some kinky
stuff happening in that exam room!!! Thanks for the story, Cindy. Another
"typical" day at the office. It kind of reminds me of the time when I was in
Optometry School and one of the students came back into the optical
dispensary carrying a broken frame in one hand and a lens in the other and
loudly proclaimed, "I need a screw!" The lady running the optical looked at
him with the straightest face she could muster and said, "Well don't come to
me for your personal needs!"
If you can read this, you clearly didn't come to ME for an eye exam. Proceed
to the next page, or go do something worthwhile. The choice is yours.
