Michelle Malkin - For English, please press '1'

townhall.com ^ | 5/19/04 | Michelle Malkin

[John Valentine]

Where I live you have to press "2" for English.

[nunya bidness]

Gotta' love it.

[CitizenUSA]

Even worse, don't you despise the internet sites for US companies that have you scroll through a list of every country in the world to find USA, even though 99% of their business is US?

[Choose Ye This Day]

Ping--for no comprendo English.

[Travis McGee]

Aprenda Espanol hoy, evite la prisa manana.

[cgk]

Pinging Michelle's list...

[cgk]

At a Michael's craft store last week, I asked an employee (loitering listlessly in the scrapbooking aisle) where the fabrics were. "Fah-brics?" I repeated slowly and gestured fruitlessly, drawing a rectangle in the air with my index fingers. She shook her head in horror and mumbled: "No understand." Oh, silly me. At my local Wal-Mart, nationwide employer of workers of dubious immigration status, I listened as a checkout lady from Africa blabbed endlessly in her native language to two visitors hanging out by her station. She didn't bother greeting me or looking at me. When I asked for a bag of items that she had forgotten to put in my cart, she ignored me. "Pardon me, can I have my bag?" I asked. "WAH?!" she finally said with a snarl, offended that I had interrupted her conversation. Whatever happened to "Thank you, please come again"?

I think Michelle must be my neighbor. Or she shops where I do.

[Choose Ye This Day]

Y'know, I have mixed feelings about this. First of all, I have a personal stake, since part of my job is to communicate info about our 401(k) plans to Spanish-speaking employees. My company offers that as a feature of our services. But that's what one business has voluntarily decided to do, and nobody (except the marketplace) is forcing us to do so.

On the other hand, I do NOT approve of taxpayer money being used to print up government forms, ballots, etc. in Spanish, Swahili, Tagalog, etc. Especially ballots! If you are going to live here and become a citizen and participate in our democratic process, there is NO EXCUSE for you not learning English.

I lived in Argentina for 2 years. I never once demanded to have forms, bills, books, prescriptions, or anything else printed nor explained to me in English. The Argentines would have laughed at me and cursed me out something fierce. If I wanted to understand something, I had to do so in Spanish, the language of the land. If I moved to South Korea, I doubt very much the government would bend over backwards to make sure everything was printed in English for me. Why do people expect/demand it of us?

[Choose Ye This Day]

Mujer muy, pero MUY bonita.

[oioiman]

I live in Miami, where the South Americans and their corporations have absolutely turned this into the United State of South America.

I am so dis-heartened at what I see on a daily basis that I weep for my country. It is not just language, but the entire culture here is no longer American (and I have lived in Los Angeles and New York City and never seen anything like this). The rich Colombians, Venezuelans, Argentinians, etc, have the means and methods to eradicate almost all vestiges of the Anglo-way of life, unlike the Mexicans and Cubans, who at least some of the time have tried to melt at least a little into the American pot.

I hate it here, and I have never said this about a place in the U.S. before. I am truly a stranger in my own country.

[garandgal]

I agree, all of this is seriously annoying. Also annoying, is trying to speak to an Indian on a customer service line. My cell phone company has employed Indians as their "directory non-assitance" company.

I have actually had to spell S-M-I-T-H. I was also asked, after repeatedly spelling the name of a major city in Tennessee, which county it was in. So, apparently, we now need to learn all of the counties in the country, in addition to the States. I would estimate, that at least 60% of the time, I am given the wrong number...often in the wrong city.

I am beginning to feel like a visitor in my own country...

[cgk]

Sí, y ella está en nuestro lado.

[Flyer]

A Nation with two languages is two Nations.

[cgk]

I was in the Social Security Office the other day and there was a sign on the wall as big as my windshield. It said:

Point to your language and we'll get you an interpreter.

It listed over a dozen different languages, using their alphabets... tagalog, vietnamese, chinese, spanish, korean, arabic, etc... I noticed no Hebrew.

[Choose Ye This Day]

Bonita, inteligente y conservadora. ¡La "trifecta"!

(Como mi esposa.)

[Madstrider]

Michelle lives in Germantown, MD -- lovely view of the lake from her back deck -- and the Wal-Mart she shops at is in the Milestone shopping center on MD355.

Of all the languages spoken by the foreigners in Germantown, oddly enough, German is not one!

:D

[Flyer]

there was a sign on the wall as big as my windshield. It said:
Point to your language and we'll get you an interpreter.

The irony is that if they can read the sign they don't really need an interpreter.

[Choose Ye This Day]

Hoo boy. That makes the blood boil. So, they can take our tax dollars, but they don't even have the decency to demand the money in English!?!!

Good grief.

[JDoutrider]

Do as I do in that situation: DEMAND to speak to an english speaking supervisor!