Noted Abroad documents DSM contributor Charlie Geer’s forays in foreign and not-so- foreign parts. Currently he is living and working in Puente Genil, a small town in southern Spain.

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Getting Awkward In the Bilingual Boudoir

They say that if you didn’t learn a given language in the cradle, the next best way to learn it is in the sack. If you really want to learn Polish, for example, date a Pole. Be this as it may, the conjugal bed should not be considered a language lab. It is first and foremost a conjugal bed, and there are much more interesting things to do in a conjugal bed than conjugate verbs.

In the bilingual boudoir it’s a good idea to maintain clear boundaries between things linguistic and things romantic. Without clear boundaries, life can get awkward. As an example, let’s say you’re engaged in a little pillow talk with your Spanish sweetheart, and you decide you’d like to compliment her in her own language, in Spanish. You’re thinking something along the lines of, In the light of the moon, my love, your face is angelic. If this sounds a bit cheesy, that’s because it is — in English. The nice thing about using a foreign language to flatter is that you can be a bit cheesy without feeling cheesy: the cheese is being filtered through another language; you don’t really process the cheese as cheese. The words just sound like, well, sounds*. The risk is that maybe you aren’t yet fluent enough to be making blandishments, cheesy or otherwise, in your sweetheart’s language. Mid-blandishment you may realize that you do not know the Spanish word for, say, angelic, and what might have been a melodious prelude to a night of delight instead becomes a linguistic trainwreck: En la luz de la luna, mi amor, tu cara es, umm—wait—I mean—espera—how—I mean—¿cómo se dice—umm—“angelic” en, umm, español?

Here one of two things will occur, neither of them exceptionally romantic:

a) Just as you don’t know the word for angelic in Spanish, your beloved does not recognize the word angelic in English, in which case she will then ask you, in Spanish, what you are trying to say about her face. You don’t know how to say what-you-are-trying-to-say-about-her-face in Spanish, that’s the whole problem, so someone will need to fetch the conjugal language dictionary from the den, which fetching will entail the finding and donning of clothes, the turning on of lights, and other practical endeavors. The result is roughly akin to a bedside iPod shuffling from Sade’s “By Your Side” to Rush’s “YYZ.”

or

b) Your sweetheart does recognize the English word angelic, and she informs you that in Spanish it’s angélica, pronounced “ahn-HAY-lee-ka.” You might now patch up your compliment, paste the mot juste in, try to salvage some semblance of a mood, but hey, why use a word when you can analyze the living hell out of it:

“Ah…angélica. Of course. Angelic, angélica. It’s a cognate.”

“Yes. Sí.”

“I suppose the masculine would be angélico, with an o.”

“Claro.”

“And the g is a soft g, not a strong, hockin’-a-loogie-here g — because it comes in the middle, not at the beginning. Right?”

At this point you’d just as well put on a pot of coffee and break out the whiteboard. Any ambience that may have been established by the light of the moon on an angelic face is surely shot beyond repair. In the future maybe you’ll remember to make sweet-talk with the language you learned back when you were still in the cradle, soiling yourself. Who knows? What sounds cheesy to you may sound exotic to her. In any case it will, presumably, cohere.

*There is a flipside to this phenomenon, a danger: it’s possible to cuss like a roofer in another language without processing the true weight of your cussing until a native knocks you upside the head for impudence.

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Plahf

In high-school language classes we learn that barnyard animals, like people, speak different languages throughout the world. Take the common pig, for example. While an American pig will oink oink, a Japanese pig will buubuu. French swine converse with a brusque groin groin, whereas Chinese swine favor a more melodious hu-lu hu-lu. For fun with the whole menagerie, check out these international animal sounds.

Curiously enough — and mercifully for undergraduate American piglets looking to satisfy core language requirements — here in Spain pigs speak with a familiar oink oink. Whether the oink originated in Spain, the United Kingdom, or the United States is a matter of dispute: no sooner does one group take credit for coining the oink than the other two denounce oinking as yet another alarming example of globalization gone wild. In any case, British and American pigs vacationing in Spain find it easy enough to communicate with their Spanish hosts, even if the same cannot always be said for their human counterparts.

This is all good fun for a bit, but in the end it’s just kind of silly, because everybody knows that, like their barnyard brethren, piglets around the world all learn to speak a universal language, which language consists mostly of guttural grunting that can range in tone from cute and snuggly to shrill and murderous. Point being that, contrary to what language textbooks might suggest, if you put a French pig, a Japanese pig, and an American pig in a pen together, they won’t have any trouble communicating with each other. Any misunderstandings that arise are sure to be cultural — shall we garnish today’s slop with béchamel, sakura sauce, or ranch dressing? — and not linguistic.

If the expressions of my Spanish friend Concha are any guide, the same cannot necessarily be said for magicians. Not that Concha is a magician — although she does do unbelievable things with paella — it’s just that whenever I might expect her to say “tah-DAHHH!” — e.g. when she presents a paella — she says “chah-CHAHHHHN!”. Presumably, then, a Spanish magician won’t tah-DAH when he pulls a rabbit out of a hat. He’ll chah-CHAHN. Similarly, where I might use “buhms” and “bahms” to represent musical riffs, Concha will use “chuhns” and “chahns”. If for some reason I am referencing the opening phrase of Beethoven’s Fifth, for example, it will go a little something like this: “bahm-bahm-bahm-bahmmmmmmm.” If for some reason Concha is referencing the opening phrase of Beethoven’s Fifth, it will sound more like this: “chahn-chahn-chahn-chahnnnnnn.”

In Spain, librarians and fed-up teachers don’t shhhhhhh, they sssssssssss. The first time I heard a Spanish librarian shush a wayward patron — “sss! sss! sss!” — I didn’t know she was shushing a wayward patron. I thought she was trying, unsuccessfully, to teach herself to whistle.

Again using Concha’s expressions as a guide, Spanish bird-crap doesn’t go “splat” when it lands on your windshield, it goes “plahf”. Same with a Spanish egg when it falls to the kitchen floor. “Plahf.” And while American alarm clocks go BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!, Spanish alarm clocks go PEEN! PEEN! PEEN! PEEN!

For the record, the language of alarm clocks translates easily. That is to say, PEEN! PEEN! PEEN! PEEN! is just as outrageous a sound at the break of day as BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! When it comes to cruelly wrenching a body out of heavenly slumber, either one will do just fine.

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She Hits Everybody

It may pain a writer and confirmed word-nerd to say so, but reading English — as opposed to hearing it, say on TV — will sometimes put a beginning ESL student at a disadvantage, at least when it comes to pronunciation. If it is read more often than it is heard, the word juice might be pronounced “joo-ees,” the word Tuesday might be pronounced “twes-day”; the word built, “bwilt”; the word team, “tee-ahm.” These are honest mistakes. (They may even recall the mnemonic devices you used for spelling tests in grade school.) The student is simply pronouncing the word according to the way it looks.

Just the reverse used to happen in Freshman Comp back home. In Freshman Comp my students would frequently spell words according to how they had heard them. To offer just a few memorable examples from a batch of Othello essays:

Roderigo puts Desdemona up on a pedal stool.

Emilia is a real pre-madonna.

Being around Iago is like being in a mind field.

If you don’t make a habit of reading books, and very few of my Freshman Comp students did, then you will write what you (think you) have heard. Take “pedal stool.” The word “pedestal” just isn’t part of your average IM chat. But if you’ve heard the word “pedestal” on television — maybe in the context of a failed relationship in a dramatic series—then maybe you will imagine some kind of device that involves pedals and stools, a pedal stool, onto which a love interest may be placed (the stool) and subsequently raised to great, unattainable heights (the pedaling). In a similar fashion, if we think of Othello’s Emilia as a submissive, pre-feminist woman, then “pre-madonna,” as in pre- Madonna “Material Girl” Ciccone, may be said to work. And taking into account Iago’s talents as a master of disguise, then yes, hanging out with him is kind of like being in a field full of minds. Kind of.

Before we get too smug about the orthographic misadventures of the philistines, let He Who Hath Never Confused a Song Lyric cast the first stone. If you’re like me, in your life you have misinterpreted, perhaps publicly, your share of song lyrics. Never having read the lyrics or the title of a particular song, you have sung said song according to how you first heard it. For most of my adolescence and some of my twenties I sang the song Bed’s Too Big Without You as “Best to be Without You.” Another Police song, Truth Hits Everybody, was, for me, “She Hits Everybody.” When the truth about these two songs finally hit me, I was still singing Tom Petty’s Don’t Do Me Like That as “Don’t Turn the Lights Out.” A therapist might have a field day with these interpretations, it’s true, but the fact is they are embarrassingly off-the-mark — much farther off than pedal stool or pre-Madonna, each of which kind of works in its own peculiar way.

Kind of.

Video: Truth Hits Everybody

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Baby, It’s Cold Inside, Part II

Last week we noted that like any other opiate the Andalusian brasero can occasionally put a relationship to the test. We should also note that it is in fact possible for a couple to share the brasero, in the way that a pair of opium enthusiasts might share a hookah. The problem is that on those nights when partners find themselves enjoying the pleasures of the brasero together, slow-baking in harmony, the impending journey from the brasero to the conjugal bed, a.k.a. the “Bed Run,” will eventually weigh heavily. Because the bed is as frigid as the air, and will remain so until one partner dives in and, at the expense of his or her own warmth, warms it up, the question as to who will make the first run can be a serious one.

Executing a Bed Run means ripping oneself away from the brasero; scurrying briskly and inelegantly over cold linoleum floors; diving into icy sheets and, once there, lending said icy sheets what little body heat the individual has left. Sticking with our narcotic analogy, and asking forgiveness in advance for a pun, the Bed Run might be seen as an exercise in cold-turkey therapy. En route the skin will certainly take the appearance that may have first given rise to the expression—hairs standing on end, popping at the follicles, the Bed Runner’s skin will resemble the skin of a cold, plucked turkey.

In most cases the Bed Run only becomes an issue over time. During the early, infatuation stage of a relationship, each party is perhaps eager to please and sacrifice for the other—no mountain too high, etc.—and offering to make the Bed Run from the brasero to the conjugal bed is an ideal way to express as much, like walking the dog, folding the laundry, or scrubbing the toilet. But like walking the dog, folding the laundry, or scrubbing the toilet, making the Bed Run is precisely the kind of sacrifice that may eventually engender resentment à la It’s not my turn to make the Bed Run, and/or engender a sour sort of nostalgia à la Remember when he/she used to like to make the Bed Run?

In extreme, not very healthy cases, one partner may end up resorting to trickery when it comes time to make a Bed Run. The popular “Loo Duck” comes to mind. The Loo Duck involves standing up from the brasero and heading toward the bedroom as if making a Bed Run, then covertly ducking into the bathroom at the last moment instead. If the move is played right, the seated party, feeling a little guilty but pleased to have the Bed Run taken care of, will soon rise and make for the bed. By the time he or she realizes that the Loo Ducker is not in the bed but in the loo, it is invariably too late: he or she is stranded in an arctic no-man’s-land, with no choice but to become the default Bed Runner, that is to say, to dive into the frosty sheets and spazz about frenetically in order to warm them. In the interest of salvaging a measure of dignity, the duped party may at this point find it prudent to pretend as though he or she has not been duped at all, but had been planning to make a valiant Bed Run all along.

On balance, the brasero may seem like more trouble than it is worth, at least in a cohabited environment. Be that as it may, few Andalusians would dare go without one. Vale la pena, hombre, vale la pena.

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Baby, It’s Cold Inside

Summers in Andalucía tend to be hotter than the winters are cold, and for centuries local building practices have reflected that fact. The white limestone façades and spacious central patios, the stone floors and shady alleyways — in August, a resident appreciates this kind of thing. The problem is February. Winter in Andalucía can turn quite cold, and when it does, flaws in the built-for-summer design reveal themselves, especially to those of us whose flats have not been retrofitted with central air. On the one hand, it’s true that in winter we don’t have to remember to put the milk back in the fridge, or chill champagne ahead of a celebration. And the spectacle of steam-breath in a living room is kind of amazing. On the other hand, it’s usually mighty fucking cold inside.

Thankfully there is a form of relief: the brasero. Found wherever Andalusians may gather indoors, the brasero is a disk-shaped space heater situated under a central round table. Way back when, hot coals supplied the brasero’s heat; today, hot coils do; but the manner of insulating the heat hasn’t changed: a pleated circular blanket known as an enaguas, or “petticoat,” is draped over the table, making an oven — and lending the whole arrangement the look of an enormous decapitated Pac-Man ghost.

The idea is to pull a chair up close to the table, draw the petticoat onto your lap, and cozy up to the brasero within. As some gather around a bonfire or a hearth, Andalusians gather around the brasero. In winter it’s just the place to enjoy a family meal, play a parlor game, visit with a friend — or simply thaw out after a walk across the room.

Aside from the risk of catastrophic house fire, the only real downside to the brasero is that certain personality types may find it habit forming. An individual tucked up close to a brasero is not easily persuaded to leave it. When an individual is en brasero, nothing else much matters. Things like dirty dishes may not get taken care of in a prompt manner, if at all. In such a way, soporific and potentially addictive, the brasero can be said to behave like an opiate. The most potent concoction — the oxycodone of brasero culture — is a deluxe recliner pulled up close to the brasero, with the petticoat drawn up to the chest area. This arrangement might be ideal for reading on a wintry day, except that the reader is not likely to get more than a few pages in before sliding into a brasero-induced stupor, followed shortly by a solid, dreamless sleep, of the sort that commonly involves drool.

As opiates often will, braseros have been known to strain relationships. In some parts of the world significant others grow to resent certain sports seasons, certain of their partner’s friends, and/or certain controlled substances. In Andalucía, at least in winter, a significant other is more likely to resent the brasero. Not that a neglected partner would ever dream of unplugging, dismantling or otherwise sabotaging the brasero. He or she does not want to go without it anymore than the offending party does. A brasero-less flat in Andalucía is major. It is not a situation to flirt with, or even joke about.

Seriously.

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