Misunderstood? When English isn't English when you travel

Lost in translation

I enjoy speaking Spanish.

Although I possess no formal training, I did become somewhat fluent during a three-month stint on a Puerto Rican newspaper in the 1970s.

Apparently that wasn't enough of an education to fool anyone.

Take the time I tried to converse with a bunch of Madrid-based colleagues during a business trip, keeping up as best I could.

Sadly, that conversation in Spanish didn't last long because shortly after we convened I tried to say something about the orange juice I had consumed that morning.

When I used the term jugo de China, the small crowd around me let out a collective chuckle. My friend wondered where I had thought up that translation.

"Do you mean jugo de naranja?" she asked. At that point, confronted with a choice between "juice of the Chinese" and "juice of the orange," it was easy to choose which interpretation is the most proper.

"Boy this is confusing," I complained, pointing out that even my simple efforts to converse in Spanish make me slip up because I can never figure out which words are slang and which are simply a special dialect.

I was slammed for my comment.

"You think Spanish is difficult?" one amigo indignantly said to me. "Try talking in YOUR language."

With that, he pointed out how in English there are many more difficulties than deciding between two ways in which to say "orange juice."

"American English is about as tough as it gets," he said, admitting he has been studying the language for two decades. "You've got your street slang, your made up words, your oxymorons, your political jargon. That's just the beginning. Even my brilliant British friends cannot figure you out."

Feeling sheepish, I realized there is a lot I can do to make speaking American English with non-English speakers a more pleasant and simple journey. Following are some rules of thumb to make that happen:

- Don't speak in acronyms. For instance, saying you want something ASAP will probably get you nothing fast.

* Stay away from metaphors in which sporting terms are used. As my fellow business traveler and author, Roger A. Axtell explains, "Asking for a ballpark figure rarely gets you to first base. Aces, end runs, slam-dunk and playing for all the marbles are not worldwide business maneuvers."

He once told me about a guy from San Diego who was talking to someone who hardly spoke English about a Monday night football game, saying that "the Chicago Bears licked the pants off the Detroit Lions." His colorful statement must have been mind altering to that particular foreign visitor.

* Other slang that has come into the vernacular thanks to our country's youth culture also can be confusing. What newcomer to the language would know that if you say you want to catch some zzzzzs you are talking about going to sleep, or that when you consider something to be awesome you mean that it is really outstanding? Likewise, don't tell someone to "be cool" or to "chill out" as this will probably cause that person to do neither.

* Some terminology is for Americans only. For example, don't introduce your loved one as your "significant other." Calling that person your roommate, your friend or your sweetheart is best if you want to make his or her relationship to you understood by just about anyone from anywhere other than here.

* Leave your accent at home. For example, saying "gimme" instead of "give it to me" or "idunno" for "I don't know," as I might if I were from Philadelphia or New York, will be impossible for many people abroad to understand. So will speaking in a drawl. One British colleague of mine was hard put to understand a Texan with whom he was trying to negotiate a deal. He asked me to translate, calling that native of the Lone Star State "a mangler of the English language."

* Common colloquial American phrases will not mean much to a person who does not live in the United States. Telling a colleague that he or she should "go for it" will not take anyone anywhere and saying someone is "out of the loop" will likely put you there.

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