This is the Week That Was: Speak Up!

LEST WE FORGET
My Memorial stories about family who gave the ultimate: In Flanders Fields;  Calgary’s Field of Crosses

Thoughts about Accurate and Honest Communication – something we need more than ever these days:

Chinese Whispers – Have you ever played it? It is when a person whispers a sentence to another person and so forth down a line of people; then they compare the original sentence to what the last person in the line heard. Invariably there is  cumulative error. It is a good demonstration of the inaccuracies of rumours or gossip… or news, for that matter…

I don’t call it gossip, I call it ’emotional speculation’.
– Laurie Colwin –

Taken a step further, how might a sentence change if it has to be translated to another language before it is passed along?

You can test this idea by using a translation program on the internet. Start with your language, then translate it to another language and so on before translating it back to your language. Here is one that I tried.

English: It is unusual for it to snow here in the fall.
The English translated to French: Il est inhabituel de neiger ici à l’automne.
The French translated to German: Es ist hier ungewöhnlich im Herbst.
The German translated to Thai: ฤดูใบไม้ร่วงนี้เป็นเรื่องผิดปกติ
The Thai translated to Welsh: Mae’r gostyngiad hwn yn anarferol.
The Welsh translated back to English: This reduction is unusual.

Timing is Everything – maybe don’t try to talk to your spouse first thing in the morning…

Types of Conversation:

Another one of those Clever Misinterpretations

“We built this city on rock and roll” – song by Starship

And Then There are Lies


This is what happens when your mouth starts working before your brain is fully in gear:

I know you believe you understand what you think I said, but I am not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant.
– Robert McCloskey, State Department spokesman, attributed –

For more Quotations of this ilk: Speaking Quotations