The year I turned 30, I spent three months in France and Spain, mostly staying with the family of my then lover, a man who called himself a SuperWog. Born in French colonial Algeria, he was a real mixture of Mediterranean bloods. He'd taught himself English watching Kojak as a squatter in London, but despite being naturally gifted with languages, he didn't care for talking much. Unlike me, an obsessively verbal type. I thought I'd go mad. I had no one to talk to, not even books to read. I'd studied German at school and he'd only given me a handful of lessons in French before we left. His family tried hard to make me feel welcome but I was desperately lost and lonely. With the vocabulary of a two year old, I began to feel and behave like one too.
Eventually, with the help of red wine and high motivation, I managed to crack the code. The more abstract the topic the easier it was to converse because the English words tended to come from French. Interestingly, though, I got by much better in Spain even though I had almost no vocab. It wasn't just because Spanish isn't slurred together like French. It was because Spaniards are so expressive. Someone would say 'equestro' and then mimic riding a horse. Hey presto. Non-verbal communication.
Last week in Turkey, the same magic was at play. My partner and I and another couple were staying in Uskudar, on the Asian side. No one spoke English and none of us had any Turkish. But we managed to have traditional Turkish baths, buy groceries, order meals, and explain and solve problems. All because of good will and high motivation. At times I felt like a one year old, especially when pretending to be a dog tearing our rubbish bags apart, but I needed to explain why I couldn't leave the bags where instructed. 'OK, OK,' said the guards. They got me. How wonderful.
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Verbal Non-Communication
ReplyDeleteWhen first I stumbled upon your site I saw in you a fellow aspiring writer. We are of similar age, in similar circumstances and living in the same city. Although we have much in common there are striking differences. After some early posts I hoped we might form a friendship and share the challenges of trying to break through with our first novels.
When your posts focussed more on your personal life than authoring, I continued to read. If you can’t be the centre of attention in your own blog, well where can you? Besides, your life sounded so much more interesting than mine, and so I was prepared to be your audience. Still the conversation seemed to be one-way traffic. Early on you would reply to my posts but later they went unanswered. Over time your posts became more sporadic. You stated you had lost the interest in writing, and that other obsession had crowded your life. You didn’t state what these were, but I hoped they were not problems with health or family.
In an effort to stimulate your interest I also focused on you, hoping that this would tickle your ego. The early posts failed to engage you and it seemed I may have taken things too far in the later ones. Your last posts hinted that I was making you our uncomfortable. It’s now been almost two months and I have resigned myself to the fact that you may not be coming back.
The Melbourne emerging writer’s scene is small and there is a chance we will bump into each other. I will of course recognise you. Given your discomfort with my recent posts, would you like me to introduce myself?
And now I bid you farewell, and in the words of Spock, wish you a long and prosperous life.
CJS
I guess I'm posting to a dead letter box, but other than the cost of a stamp it's a no-cost exercise. I just had my first publication; very minor but I thought I'd share it with someone who has (or had) an interest in such things.
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