another angry woman , another video.
on 11/30/2011 at 11:54 AM
Just a couple of thoughts on living in a foreign country.
When I was a kid, I lived with my parents in Germany for about 6 months, while my father researched some old manuscripts. My father explained it very simply. We were visiting a different country where the people spoke a different language. He said that while many Germans spoke some amount of English, not all did and I should be grateful for the ones who did. I was in their country and I needed to learn at least basic “please and thank you” in German just as a matter of respect for the country we were visiting. The same applied when we took some side trips to Italy, Switzerland and France.
Now I’m in my home town of Los Angeles, California and it’s hard not to feel that English is a foreign language.
A while back, I was working in a section of Orange County called Little Saigon. A lot of Viet Namese refugees settled there after the fall of Saigon. Not only were there lots of small business owned by the refugees and their descendents, a lot of them were doctors, attorneys, dentists, accountants and other serious professions. There were also a lot of signs where some were running for political office. They came, they learned English, they went to school and they earned their slice of the American Pie.
Well said doc.
When we lived in Riverside one of our doctors was from Vietnam. He spoke English perfectly, and I wish we had him here.I did hear complaints from some folks though, about my former town of San Gabriel. I haven’t been back there in perhaps 30 years so have no personal knowledge. But I had heard about large scale immigrants from that part of the world and store signs all in a foreign language with hardly a bow to English. On the whole though, you are quite right. It seems those particular folks have the will and the work ethic.
12/01/2011 at 01:38 AM
