Translator required.

[planedriver]

Had to go to Centrelink yesterday with a query about my aged pension.

 

They had to get a translator, as they weren't used to someone speaking English:whisper:

 

 

[Robbo]

 

[pmccarthy]

When my brother drove taxis in Sydney his nickname was The Aussie.

 

 

[cscotthendry]

I grew up in South Florida and when I was young, some of the shops in Miami had signs sayin "si habla espanol" now some of the shops have signs "Yes! We speak English"

 

 

[SSCBD]

Flying into England at Heathrow at 5 am from Australia and walking those long tunnels was a shock, I thought I was in India with all the turbans at customs.

 

 

[bexrbetter]

Went to the Australian Consulate last month to find the 2 guards inside the consulate couldn't speak a word of English.

 

Yes it's in China but still, once you step inside you are technically on Australian soil ....

 

Last year I had a problem with dealings with the Consulate and officially complained to the Consulate General both at Chengdu and Beijing, Re: the Chinese staff not understanding what issues I had from an Australian cultural perspective.

 

 

[Kiwi303]

When I needed to have a translation done, I stopped by the British consulate in Chognqing, thinking as an official place they would have a list of reputable translation services I could use... Only one guy there spoke English, They seem to be set up to deal with Chinese wanting to go to England, not Commonwealth people with problems.

 

 

[planedriver]

When my brother drove taxis in Sydney his nickname was The Aussie.

That's pretty cool!

When I first arrived in Oz almost 40yrs ago, I drove cabs for a while too.

 

Not being very familiar with Sydney at the time, my name changed to Richard Cranium on a few occasions:yikes:

 

 

[Phil Perry]

Had to go to Centrelink yesterday with a query about my aged pension.They had to get a translator, as they weren't used to someone speaking English:whisper:

Aw,. . .come on Planey,. . . . . .how many Aussies d'you know who can speak. . . . . . .Inglish ? ? ? ? ?

 

 

[Phil Perry]

That's pretty cool!When I first arrived in Oz almost 40yrs ago, I drove cabs for a while too.

 

Not being very familiar with Sydney at the time, my name changed to Richard Cranium on a few occasions:yikes:

Actually,. . .I drove Yellow Cabs in Melbourne for six months, shortly after arriving in the country. . . . . I figured that it was the best way to find my way around all the suburbs, and suburbs within suburbs etc,. . I mean,. . .let's face it . . . .if someone knows where they are going, they are hardly going to show you the longest way around are they ? ? ? ? It worked for me,. . .although the "Runners" and those who threatened me with knives were a bit of a downer,. . . but ONLY ONE of them got away with this,. . .all the others got chased down and paid in the end,. . .BUT THEN. . .I was a young buck in them thar days. . . . . .

 

I knew Melbourne extremely well though as a result,. . . .shame we moved to Brissy after a couple of years and NO. . .I Didn't apply for a Taxi license there. . . . . .it's so small ( or it WAS. . .) that it was easy to find me way around ! ! ! !

 

 

[Phil Perry]

Went to the Australian Consulate last month to find the 2 guards inside the consulate couldn't speak a word of English.Yes it's in China but still, once you step inside you are technically on Australian soil ....

 

Last year I had a problem with dealings with the Consulate and officially complained to the Consulate General both at Chengdu and Beijing, Re: the Chinese staff not understanding what issues I had from an Australian cultural perspective.

But Shirley ( and don't call me Shirley ) surely you speak bloody good chinky now Bex, FCS,. . . I mean . . .Jeeze how long have you bin there ? ? ? When I go to a foreign country, ( nowadays just on vacation ) I get hold of a phrasebook a couple of weeks in advance, and write down the usual phrases that I may need and learn them. . .including EVERY TIME how to count to a hundred. . .- very important when paying for stuff. . . .

 

I can't BELIEVE that you are not FLOOOOOOOENT in chinkaboo now,. . . ? ? ? ? Or is it that there are so many different dialects that it isn't really practical to learn them all,. . .rather like English, where dialects can be totally diffferent with a very small geographical shift. . . ? ? ? ?

 

 

[Phil Perry]

That's pretty cool!When I first arrived in Oz almost 40yrs ago, I drove cabs for a while too.

 

Not being very familiar with Sydney at the time, my name changed to Richard Cranium on a few occasions:yikes:

Yes but,. . .unless you're picking up raw tourists from the airport,. . .most of the passengers KNOW where they want to go don't they ? ? ? ? I once collected a rather Brassy Yank tourist and his Lady from Tullamarine to go to St. Kilda,. . he said, " Hey Buddy,. . .we passed the same K-Mart store three times,. . .are you givin' me the run around . . .". . .I said, " No Sir, certainly NOT. . .. . .we have a lot of those in Melbourne Sir. . . . .

 

 

[hihosland]

Phil said

 

".rather like English, where dialects can be totally different with a very small geographical shift. . . ? ? ?"

 

I well remember being in a fast food joint in California and thinking that the kid serving and I could easily write to each other but neither could understand the other's accent

 

 

[Phil Perry]

Flying into England at Heathrow at 5 am from Australia and walking those long tunnels was a shock, I thought I was in India with all the turbans at customs.

The "Turbans" would be Sikhs. . . . .no worries, Brilliant people. . . .don't want to take over our country. . .. . . .it's the men wearing dresses and pyjamas you need to look out for. . . . . . .

 

 

[Marty_d]

The "Turbans" would be Sikhs. . . . .no worries, Brilliant people. . . .don't want to take over our country. . .. . . .it's the men wearing dresses and pyjamas you need to look out for. . . . . . .

What, Boy George and Eddie Izzard?

 

 

[bexrbetter]

I well remember being in a fast food joint in California and thinking that the kid serving and I could easily write to each other but neither could understand the other's accent

There's about 70 distinct Chinese languages, hundreds of local accents (almost always split by a mountain range), variations of Madarine are spoken by about 70% and about 30% Cantonese. Mandarine is taught in all schools.

 

Amazingly Canton and Mandarine are completely different and not a word can be understood from each other, but they have the same characters for reading. On the other hand, Taiwan speaks Mandarine but read another set of characters entirely (Traditional Characters, Mainland reads Simplified Characters).

 

Some oddities are Shanghai has it's own language so unique that n one from anywhere else in China can understand it, they all speak fluent Mandarine there as well luckily.

 

Where I come from, Sichuan Province, has it's own language, about 80% Mandarine but with some heavy accents. I was surprised to find that Deng Xiao Ping, the Chinese Premier who took over after Mao's death and opened up China to what it is today, was born not far from me and spoke Sichuan language the whole time in office.

 

Anyway Phil, my Chinese is bad based on 10 years here, that's true, but I have found anywhere in the World that "Jiggy Jiggy?" works just fine.

 

 

[pmccarthy]

You like jigajig?

 

 

[Marty_d]

A bloke is on holiday in Thailand with his missus. She's out shopping one day and he's wandering around by himself when he spots a massage parlour.

 

He thinks a massage would be nice so he goes in and a lovely young thing starts massaging him. He's only covered by a towel and gets a bit excited, so when she rolls him over to do the front of his legs, the tent becomes obvious.

 

She stops, looks down and smiles. "Hey mister - you want wank?"

 

He thinks about it a bit (as much as he can with no blood left in his brain), thinks "what the hell" and murmers "Yes, please!"

 

She smiles again and walks out of the room.

 

A couple of minutes later she walks back in and says "You finish yet?"

 

 

[Robbo]

A bloke is on holiday in Thailand with his missus. She's out shopping one day and he's wandering around by himself when he spots a massage parlour. He thinks a massage would be nice so he goes in and a lovely young thing starts massaging him. He's only covered by a towel and gets a bit excited, so when she rolls him over to do the front of his legs, the tent becomes obvious.

She stops, looks down and smiles. "Hey mister - you want wank?"

 

He thinks about it a bit (as much as he can with no blood left in his brain), thinks "what the hell" and murmers "Yes, please!"

 

She smiles again and walks out of the room.

 

A couple of minutes later she walks back in and says "You finish yet?"

Classic !!

 

 

[PA.]

That's pretty cool!When I first arrived in Oz almost 40yrs ago, I drove cabs for a while too.

 

Not being very familiar with Sydney at the time, my name changed to Richard Cranium on a few occasions:yikes:

When I was in Bali I saw a sign on the side of a Taxi, it read "English speaking driver." I thought that's a fantastic idea, we should do that in Australia.

 

 

[planedriver]

Last month while on a cruise, and we stopped at Lombok and saw a similar sign, and I said the same thing.

 

Don't get me started on cabbies at the moment, I'm fuming!

 

My very elderly neighbor had her frail sister arrive from interstate on a late flight last night for Christmas and gave the destination address to the driver. We are only about 6km from Mascot Airport, and after driving her around for almost 2hrs she arrived here and he demanded $200 which she paid. He also told her he wanted another 20 bucks when she asked him to help her get her case out of the boot. Unfortunately she didn't get the cabs number and arrived here at 2AM.

 

Bast*rd!

 

Beware! they are still out there. Should have been a 10 minute ride normally about $22.

 

 

[Robbo]

Last month while on a cruise, and we stopped at Lombok and saw a similar sign, and I said the same thing.Don't get me started on cabbies at the moment, I'm fuming!

My very elderly neighbor had her frail sister arrive from interstate on a late flight last night for Christmas and gave the destination address to the driver. We are only about 6km from Mascot Airport, and after driving her around for almost 2hrs she arrived here and he demanded $200 which she paid. He also told her he wanted another 20 bucks when she asked him to help her get her case out of the boot. Unfortunately she didn't get the cabs number and arrived here at 2AM.

 

Bast*rd!

 

Beware! they are still out there. Should have been a 10 minute ride normally about $22.

I don't use Taxi's that often but when I do I start up a convo and say it's been a really busy day and then after a few minutes they always ask "what do you do for work?"

And I say nothing really interesting I just work for the Taxi directorate.

 

Hmmm the moment I say that it's like they flick a switch to some hidden rocket launcher, really quick trip with a discount

 

 

[Litespeed]

Yep,

 

such a rip off, and now Baird is going to give them $250,000,000 to compete in a normal market as Uber comes in. And the consumer also pays a $1 per ride as a bullshite tax to ride in this new cheaper market.

 

After years of the taxi plate cartel we have to pay the buggars for a fair go.

 

And those LNP guys are always the best with economics........ for their mates