On Speaking Multiple Languages
I was introduced at an early age to the fact that not everyone speaks English. My father brought home a friend whose native language was Spanish; I was fascinated overhearing them speak. He also had a part-time job editing a journal carrying news about Russia. I got to hear him painfully going through individual words with a large dictionary at his side.
His mother’s family was from Denmark, and eventually I learned he read and spoke a little Danish and Norwegian (essentially the same language). When I joined the military and went to Germany, he came to visit. That’s where I learned he spoke German and French. And some Italian. I traveled with my mother to Milwaukee where her family lived, and learned that she (and they) spoke German. Most of the relatives were third- or fourth-generation but still spoke German.
During a very long bus tour of West Germany, I taught myself Portuguese for something to do, and primarily spoke French to people near the border. My German improved significantly, and in 1971 my unit, the Army Chorus in Europe, was sent to Barcelona to participate in an international music festival. I was one of several people with multiple languages, and performed as a translator in Castilian Spanish (rough equivalent to the Queen’s English), English, German, French and Italian. I also translated for a Romance language I could not identify, possibly Romanian or Maltese. Needless to say, I was quite popular.
Near the end of the event, speakers of these and a multitude of other languages, sought me out for simultaneous two-way interpreter duty in every one of those languages. After fifteen minutes my brain broke, and I could not speak anything. The only sounds I could make were grunts. That lasted through the trip back to Germany.
In 1971 I flew back from Germany to the U.S., and married my fiancée on January 2, 1972. Through the wonders of scheduling, we wound up on separate flights for the return. I landed first, and checked in with my unit. The message waiting for me was to report immediately to personnel and see Sergeant Unpronounceable. It seemed the military had begun automating personnel records and it was discovered that I spoke multiple languages. I was offered two options: Join the Olympic Coordination Organization in Munich or take an unidentified position in Berlin.
My decision was a no-brainer. I would dig ditches to go to Berlin. I met my new bride at the Frankfurt airport and we struggled carrying everything we owned to the apartment I had rented. The rented VW got us there and back to the Frankfurt Airport the next morning to catch the overnight Army train into Berlin. It was the only way to get through East Germany by land at the time. I found it helpful to learn basic Turkish, because many of the service workers in Berlin were Turks.
I never retained a word of Turkish. Which is a shame, because there are several hundred million people in Asia and Europe who speak Turkic languages.
In 1991 my employer was engaged to produce an Area Handbook on the Republic of the Marshall Islands. I was the principal researcher and author of the book. I flew to Majuro, the Capital. I quickly learned enough of the language to get around. Among others, I interviewed the Chief of Medicine at the local hospital. They were very poorly-funded, and short on anesthetics and analgesia, so they allowed the local shaman to practice pain control. He described how they did it, and I told him it was simple. Without knowing it, they were practicing hypnosis.
I told him he and all other Western Medicine practitioners could do the same. I gave him the basics in less than an hour, and later sent him textbooks. There were plenty of documents in English about the Japanese occupation of Micronesia, but none about the German. The records were maintained in the Community College of Micronesia on the island of Pohnpei. I traveled to Pohnpei, a small volcanic island, and stepped from the real world into a strange dream
I collected my baggage and looked around for a rental car. An airport worker explained that all rental cars were in the city of Kolonia. I should call one of them. I found a telephone but it required a token; as you’ve already deduced, those were only available in the capital city of Kolonia. I bribed an airport worker to take me to where the rental cars were located and picked one out. It was owned by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, and had no fuel. I filled the tank, rented the car, and took off for the US Embassy.
I met first with the Deputy Chief of Mission, possibly the least intelligent white woman I had ever met. She proved worthless and handed me off to her boss, the Ambassador, an affirmative action appointment who understood nothing about the country. I told her I was first going to meet with Bethwell Henry, whom our CEO knew. And, I had heard from someone that I should meet Bailey Olter. She looked down at me and told me I had no knowledge of anything, and that Bethwell was merely the Postmaster General, a purely ceremonial post, while Olter was a reprobate and a drunk with whom she would have nothing to do. He was a politician, and she could find out anything she wanted from his sister who worked as a cleaner in the Embassy. Clueless.
My Good Friend Bethwell Henry
I visited Bethwell, and learned that he had been the runner-up in the last presidential election, and the winner was a good friend who wanted to keep Bethwell available to give advice. Bethwell was the Grand Old Man of Micronesian politics, having served as the President of the House of Representatives and then President of the Senate in the Government of Micronesia. He was a simple man, which is not to say he was a simpleton. He remains one of the smartest people I know. Bailey did indeed strike me as a reprobate and drunk, and one hell of a great guy. I learned what Pohpeian I could, and met most of the cabinet, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and had a blast. My rented car was shoved off the road by an eight-foot monitor lizard, so I walked up to the seat of government and enlisted volunteers to help me get my car back on the road.
Later, Bailey invited me to his inauguration as President; the Ambassador’s invitation must have gotten lost in the mail. I was hired to write and get printed a book on the history and culture of Micronesia; all they had were US civics textbooks, with which the children could not identify.
In learning some Pohnpeian, I found I had ordered up a beer for breakfast. I discovered that “two” wasn’t “one and one,” there were actual words for the other numbers. I learned that the national drink was Budweiser, that it was socially acceptable for women to go topless but not men, and these people pitied Americans. They saw that Americans never wanted what they had, but thought having what they wanted would produce happiness.
Back on Majuro I met with the last surviving long-canoe builder. The locals had been making them for centuries despite the lack of hardwood trees. They were redwoods and sequoias that had fallen into streams in North America and would float to Micronesia. I also met with the Iroij (pronounced Ear-ROICH) of Bikini that had been used for nuclear tests, and all his people were relocated twice since then; those alive today will never see their original home again.
Most readers have seen Pohnpei; the escarpment shown in the original King Kong is actually on the north shore of the island.
Then I was standing next to the fax when one came in for the partner who ran the practice. I read the request for an aviation security expert, and was one by the time I reached Jack’s office. I flew to the Middle East, where the company’s commercial division was restructuring an absolute monarchy’s aviation unit. I spent about a week meeting with the Expats who ran it plus the locals who provided security. Among other things I met with the the Crown Prince, his national security advisor and a wealthy businessman who, together, ran the country.
In an early meeting I heard the word for “farm,” and asked the speaker how big his farm was. Suddenly, every rifle in the room was pointed at me. I realized I had said something wrong, and asked him what crops he grew on his farm. Everyone began laughing. It seems the word I was using for “farm” was an obscene term for penis.
I returned there for regular visits over the next two years, had to learn Urdu to talk to local taxi drivers, then discovered that Hindi and Urdu were nearly identical. Add two more to the list. Then I learned Lebanese, which is an admixture of English, French and Arabic. One simply uses the best word for the situation, and there are no rules. It’s now past my bedtime and I think I’ve run out of languages.
What a wonderful read. The doors that open up with learning different languages is painted beautifully. It is about opening yourself up to the world and making meaningful connections.
Thank you for sharing this. Inspiring
I always admired those who had a gift for language. I studied Spanish in high school, enough to get by. Then assigned to Japan in the military, I get reasonably competent in Japanese with a smattering of immersion Korean. I found that I would cross the Spanish and Japanese which got "the look". An ex-wife of German origin once was chatting with a German couple in our US home. The couple only spoke German and has "the look" as my wife dropped English phrases. In the UK I dated a lady who was conversant in multiple languages, enough to host big shot meetings about big shot stuff among men from different nations. I think the ability to learn language involves brain training that I never acquired. OTOH, when a person is faced with the necessity, I imagine they adapt.
I enjoy your war stories in these SubStack snippets that you kindly share with us. Thanks for a look into a few of your adventures. Our bodies might be failing us but we can be thankful that our minds remain and we can share.