EFL-isms

Although teaching English as a foreign language has its challenges – as does any realm of teaching – it also has its rewards. And often, these rewards come in the form of adorable mistakes, experiments and just overall non native-speaker…ness.

For the past couple of years, I’ve been collecting some of my favorite examples, and these, ladies and gentlemen, are them, er, they, er, just read on.

When vacations come around, my favorite go-to activity when we’re back in school is to do a review of past simple and have my students tell me what they did on vacation. It’s a good excuse to review a useful tense with content that interests them, and it also allows Mr. Matt to not have to plan anything. Win-win-win.

This year, I got this gem:

What did you do on Christmas vacation?
"I bought pineapple.
I cut fruit.
I made a fruit salad.
I killed a cop."

Well, that escalated quickly.

As a man who enjoys his toilet humor, I also couldn’t help but include some of those.

We do a dictation tournament where they have to correctly write the word I tell them on the board. It’s a head-to-head competition, and the winner moves on, March Madness style.

Welp, we were reviewing adjectives, and when I told them to write “fat,” I got:

“FARTS.”

This student had no idea what she had written, which is why she didn’t know the reason she’d just made Mr. Matt double over in laughter.

Speaking of farts, I was deep in a lesson on, well, to be honest, I don’t remember anymore, but what I do remember is, at some point, the lesson devolved into a five-minute detour on a cultural exchange of making farting noises with parts of our body. I can honestly say I learned more than I taught that day.

So let’s talk about poop now.

Sometimes TEFL gems come not from mistakes, but from an accent. This is one of those.

In another post-vacation class, we were talking about what one student did over Christmas vacation:

“I played with my poopie.”

“Um, your what?”

“My poopie.”

After about five seconds spent in suspended animation, dl. Met finally realizes what she’s trying to say: “Oh, your PUPPY!”

“Yes, I played with my puppy.”

“Yeah, that’s way better.”

Often, as an EFL teacher, you have the privilege of seeing your language through the eyes of a non-native speaker. And sometimes, the insightfulness of those eyes surprise, and impress, you.

While doing a lesson on anatomy, we reached the toes, which is a difficult concept for Romanian speakers because they more or less use the same word.

"What are these called?"
"Fingers?"
"No, we have a different word for the ones on the foot."
"Foot-gers?"

“Well, no. But they should be.”

Google Translate is a great tool, if you want to get in the ballpark. However, I’ve found that Google Translate is responsible for some of my favorite translation blunders.

First, in yet another lesson where we talked about Christmas vacation, I had at least two students make this mistake. In Romanian, there are three A’s, all of which have a different accent and are, therefore, different letters. It usually doesn’t make that big of a difference. This time, it did.

What my students wanted to say was:

What they actually said was:

Hungarian is a really hard language. It has almost a complete lack of cognates, glues its prepositions on the end of words and has nearly indecipherable grammar. However, some things aren’t that hard like, for instance, when I tried to confirm the translation of how to say “Mr. Teacher,” something I hear all the time. This, I didn’t expect:

And finally, my favorite of the lot. I’ll just say that this is supposed to translate to, “I went sledding.” I’ll also say that no less than four seventh graders said this in front of the entire class.

Got it, Bogdan. Thanks for the heads up. Now back to what you did on vacation.

A Wednesday With Fane

I recently had the pleasure of meeting with Fane Tulpan, a Romanian mountain climber who, in 2003, became the first Romanian to summit Everest.

Fane's a wiry guy with a mind so enthusiastic and energetic, his mouth has a tough time keeping up.

Whether it be talking about passing dead bodies on the way to the top of the world or how his toddler son wakes him up at 7 o'clock every morning to play, Fane grips you, and keeps you.

(Fane shows me his picture book from his successful trip to the top of Everest in 2003.)

However, what most impressed me about Fane was not his contagious enthusiasm, nor was it his unassuming, friendly demeanor, especially considering his impressive resume. What most impressed me was his perspective.

Despite his successful summits of Everest, Kilimanjaro and McKinley, Fane's most impactful story, at least on me, was about his failed expedition up K2. After nearly two months on the mountain, and just about one thousand meters from the top of the world's second largest peak, he turned back. Why?

According to his website, it was due to weather and Grade 1 frostbite on his toes. However, with me, he expanded:

"The mountain isn't even worth my thumb, much less my life," he said. "Everyone has their Everest. Your Everest might be to build an American school in Bucharest. My Everest isn't Everest. It's my family."

Dl. Met in Action

I've realized that the majority of my blogs posted in this space have been about travel, special events, holidays, etc. I fear that most of you think Peace Corps is a 27-month vacation. I assure you that, even though it's an incredible experience, we're still here to work.

With that, I present to you proof. Here are some pictures of Dl. Met in action. The first group is a few shots of my kids after a cool post-it note activity that works with parts of the body. It is what it appears to be: Students pin post-it notes to one of their classmates to label him or her.

The second group of photos is us doing the Animal Action song, one of our greatest hits.

"MOVE LIKE A BIIIIIRD!"

"MOVE LIKE AN ELEPHANT!!!"

"MOVE LIKE A MOOOOOONKEEEEY!"

So there you have it, proof that I've been working the past two years.

Then again, perhaps this doesn't seem like work in the traditional sense of the term. Perhaps it's because we get to run around and act like monkeys and dance and sing songs. Then again, if that's your opinion, here's my retort: Perhaps you should try it at your office at least once a day, and maybe your job wouldn't seem so much like work either.

Tulgheș Wikipedia Page! Now in English!

The title pretty much says it all, but we now have a lengthy, informative wikipedia page in English about our sleepy, humble mountain town, Tulgheș.

Well, it's technically not new, but the old one only had a couple of paragraphs about the village. Now it's your one-stop shopping for historical information, economic information, tourism hot spots, transportation information and even "Geomorphological and Climactic Highlights"! WHAT!

The English page was translated from the Romanian page by my English Club, along with a hearty assist from my awesome counterpart.

So read up, folks! You now no longer need my inane blog posts to learn about this place. You can go right to the source!

Da! In sfarsit! Am fost la schi!

For two winters now, I’ve been having this exact same conversation with people:

“Do you know how to ski?”

“Yes, I know how to ski.”

“Have you been skiing here?”

“No, I haven’t.”

“Why not?”

This is where I would spew whatever seemingly sufficient excuse was the first to arrive on my tongue: “I don’t have skis.” “I’m busy this weekend, and then every weekend after that forever.” “I don’t have legs.”

However, the truth is that I really didn’t have a reason, so finally, after last weekend, this conversation no longer ends this way. Instead, it goes:

“Have you been skiing here?”

“DA!”

Skiing in Romania, specifically in a great village about 15 miles away called Borsec (famous for its mountain spring water that it exports throughout the world), was certainly a new experience for me.

The rental process is similar to the places I’ve been in the U.S., although I paid about $6 for skis, poles and boots. That, and I got some sweet pink boots to rock on the slopes. Yes, I noticed that they were this color before I left the rental hut. No, I didn’t request different ones.

After that, the lift ticket is about $8 for four hours. However, this is where it starts to get interesting. At this particular slope, they don’t have chairlifts. They sort of just have buttlifts.

Let me explain.

Basically, you stand in line like you would for the chairlift in the U.S., and they have a similar support system running up the hill. However, here, they have this tiny little retractable seat attached to the overhead line, which you grab, shove into your nethers and let it drag you by the rump up the hill, while your skis glide along on the ground below.

As a byproduct, everyone has little wet marks on their butts all day. At first, I thought it meant these people had fallen on their butts and silently mocked them. Then, I realized everyone had them and put together that it was from the chairlift. Then, I realized that meant I had one too and silently chided myself for mocking others' wet-buttedness while being wet-butted myself. You know what they say about people with wet butts and glass houses. Get out of the kitchen. Or something.

Anyway, it’s an interesting, new experience, but realistically, it’s much more tiring on the legs, especially if those legs haven’t been skiing in four years.

Other than that, the slope was extremely well groomed, partly because we all take a forced break when this guy comes out to groom it.

And, as always, I can’t complain about the scenery.

I'd call it a success story. It was a new experience and a beautiful day on the slopes with zero injuries, unless you count the wet butt.

A venit iarnă!

On Dec. 5-6, in the year of our Lord 2012, Tulgheș received its first significant snowfall of the year. For a place that's still attractive in miserable conditions, Tulgheș is quite possibly at its best in white. Winter wonderland: activate.

"Sa traiasca Obama!"

“Sa traiasca Obama!” (Long live Obama!)

I heard it this morning on the way to school. Not more than an hour earlier, the election had been called in his favor, and already, one of my friends here in Tulgheș was congratulating me.

Four years ago, I also watched the election called for Obama from foreign soil. I was in the Auckland airport, waiting for a flight home. As I and people from all over the world gathered around the television to watch McCain’s concession speech and Obama’s victory speech, an odd thing happened: When people found out I was American, they began shaking my hand. I shook more hands than I can count that day, and I was proud to do it.

Now, I’m not writing this blog to pat America on the back for reelecting Obama, even if I did vote for him. Nor am I writing it to criticize Mitt Romney or the GOP, even if I tend to disagree with them on how our government should be run. The point I’m trying to make, as I write this from my Romanian village, is this: Whatever we do, the world is watching.

Which is why we need to be better.

This has never been more apparent to me as it’s been since I’ve moved abroad. For the last year and a half, I’ve lived as the only American in a small village in Romania, and whether I want to be or not, I’m an American ambassador by default.

I’ve listened as people talk about their frustrations with Romania and Romanian politics and clenched my teeth as I tried not to tell them how imperfect our system is: how campaign finance is completely out of control, how partisan politics and obstructionism have simply become the norm, how polarizing vitriol has turned what should be a mere disagreement into the end of friendships, and how hot-button issues have completely overshadowed the real, widespread problems plaguing our nation.

Oh, and imagine yourself trying to defend things like “Honey Boo Boo” and Snooki.

Even through all this, I’ve found that, to my friends and colleagues here, we remain an example to strive toward. Maybe it’s just because they toss on their rose-colored glasses when they look west, or perhaps it’s simply because, as Americans, our problems have nothing on the majority of the rest of the world’s. However, they still see us as an example.

Which is why, I say again, we need to be better.

To those in Washington, it’s time to do what you believe is right, not for reelection, not for special interests, but what you believe is right morally, ethically and for US, the people.

And WE need to be better people. Less division, more compromise. Less vitriol, more understanding.

If we want to continue to be a global leader, we need to look homeward and do better. We need to take a step back from the sense of entitlement previous generations earned for us, and re-earn that respect through responsible, reasonable policy and behavior.

Perhaps it’s because participating in yet another peaceful election fills me with pride, or perhaps I’m borrowing my neighbors’ rose-colored glasses, but at least today, I’m going to be hopeful that, in the coming years, we’re going to learn to stop letting ourselves be controlled by hateful soundbites and partisanship, and we’re going to learn to work together.

“I have never been more hopeful about America. And I ask you to sustain that hope. I'm not talking about blind optimism, the kind of hope that just ignores the enormity of the tasks ahead or the roadblocks that stand in our path. I'm not talking about the wishful idealism that allows us to just sit on the sidelines or shirk from a fight.

“I have always believed that hope is that stubborn thing inside us that insists, despite all the evidence to the contrary, that something better awaits us so long as we have the courage to keep reaching, to keep working, to keep fighting….

“I believe we can seize this future together because we are not as divided as our politics suggests. We're not as cynical as the pundits believe. We are greater than the sum of our individual ambitions, and we remain more than a collection of red states and blue states. We are and forever will be the United States of America.”
– President Barack Obama