Trilingual Bilateral Culture Exchange

Many people thought I was crazy for attempting to learn Arabic: a foreign language with a different alphabet, totally different grammar, and even different sounds that just don’t exist in English (or any European language).

Well now I am taking Russian, another language with another different alphabet.

So how crazy is it that I'm taking the third language/alphabet in the second language/alphabet. That is right, I am taking a Russian class explained in Arabic. It's left-to-right again, but explained in the right-to-left.

Needless to say it is quite an exercise in toggling. All the words we learn we get the Arabic translation for. However, Arabic is a terrible language to write down phonetics (how a word actually sounds). So I’ve taken to writing the Russian word down with the Arabic translation next to it, but then writing the phonetic version of how it is pronounced in English letters. It creates quite a headache sometimes.

EXAMPLE:

Преподавательница = مدرسة = prepadaVAtyilniitsa

“Teacher.”

OR:

Откуда вы приехали? = Otkuda Vee Priyekhali? من أين وصلت؟ =

Meaning “Where did you come from?”

However, the workout which is switching between my second language and third language while using letters from my first language to ensure pronunciation is nothing compared to the fascinating (and perhaps even more headache-inspiring) experience of being the foreigner in a class full or Egyptians. At first our teacher, as much to show off to me his own language skills as to help me, explained everything in both English and Arabic. This simply angered the other students who couldn’t understand his English. To be truthful I couldn’t understand much of his English either; his Arabic explanations were much clearer. I quietly pulled him aside after the first week and asked him to just explain things in Arabic, since I was trying to learn both Arabic and Russian. He laughed and agreed, though I’ve had to remind him a couple of times since then.

Yesterday he taught us a phrase that means “Repetition is the mother of learning.” The phrase rhymes in Russian so it sounds nice. The teacher explained what it meant in Arabic but then rendered an English translation in his thick accent, “Rreapeating is mother of educating.” I quickly said, “hey, no English” (in Arabic), and then thoughtlessly added (in Arabic) that “we don’t have a proverb like that, it’s better in Arabic.” Of course, in retrospect, we do (“practice makes perfect.”) but I was simply stating the literal translation sounded weird.

However, then my friend Ahmed jumped in, “Actually, that’s not a proverb, it’s more of a saying.” Then, he said (in Arabic) “in English you would call that an expression.” He said “expression” in English. This prompted Mustafa, another classmate, to wonder whether it would properly be translated as “saying” or “expression.” After about 3 minutes of discussing the finer points of how to translate the various terms for “idiomatic expression,” “pithy saying,” and “proverb,” with additional discussion as to which category “repetition is the mother of learning” fit into, we finally were able to move on to the next point.

Such is the nature of bilateral cultural exchange in a third language.

I’ve learned some about Egyptian students. Of course, I’m generalizing, but I think it’s a safe statement that observations which would be considered hurtful or lacking tact in the West are not that big of deal. Here are some of the things my classmates have said about me either to my face or to other people about me.

“Curtis does not have very good pronunciation in Russian.”
“Curtis, why do you not study very hard.”
“Curtis, you are not doing very well, you should consider dropping out so as to not waste your time.”
“Curtis is kind of lazy in Russian.”

It kind of cracks me up, because I’m actually not that worse than my classmates. I pronounce Russian terribly with an American accent, they pronounce it terribly with an Egyptian one. However, since the rest of them are Egyptian and so is our teacher, I’m the one that looks bad. As for the laziness accusation, it is true that I am a little bit less focused. I’m learning more Arabic than Russian from these classes, and am just hoping to pick up a few helpful phrases. The four of them want to become Russian tour guides by the end of the summer.

Of course, the whole tact thing doesn’t just apply to language. My friend Ahmed has also said, at various points to either me or my friends:

“Why does your hair always look so bad? Why don’t you brush it?”

“You eat more than any girl I have ever known.”

“Clay you are very weak in Arabic language.”

To him, these are just statements of fact, objective observations; no insult or shame is implied.

Nor, for the record, is any insult or shame taken. Doing trilingual bilateral cultural exchange can't allow for it.