Joanna's Singapore adventures

With Singapore's myriad of languages, dialects and accents plus much distinctive slang of its own, there is plenty of opportunity for things to get a bit lost in translation here!

Despite the fact that I am very obviously not Chinese, that doesn't seem to register with everyone. Often shop keepers will tell me prices in Mandarin. I just try to hand them what i think should be enough money and hope i get it right! Sometimes they have actually told me the price in English but their accents are too thick to work out what they are saying!

Many of my friends are comfortable in 2 or 3 languages so think nothing of dropping a few words of another one of their languages into a conversation otherwise in English. Sometimes this is because English doesn't have a suitable equivalent to the word or saying they'd like to use. Puzzlingly, sometimes even when English has an acceptable equivalent people will use another language anyway. My friends seem to particularly like the Mandarin word máfɑn (麻烦) which means troublesome or problematic. People are always gracious about translating but it can still be a bit awkward!

The other way things can get lost in translation is words that mean different things in Singaporean English to Australian English. One such word is mug/mugging. In Australia a mugging is a violent robbery. In Singapore mugging is to study obsessively, often by rote memorization. Needless to say it is a topic of conversation that comes up a lot at this time of semester. Of course when I stop to think about what they are saying, I know what they mean. However, my first response to hearing a statement like "So much mugging going on at the airport lah!" is to wonder when the airport because ridden with violent crime, not to ponder why on earth people would want to study there.

Most Singaporeans can speak pretty good English when they have to. When they don’t have to they are likely to use Singlish. Singlish is a creole language that mixes words from English, Mandarin Chinese, Malay, Hokkien (a Chinese dialect), Tamil and an assortment of other dialects. The grammar shows a strong Chinese influence. Sometimes it sounds like slightly mangled English, sometimes it is almost impossible to understand if you just know English. Check out the Coxford Singlish dictionary for some examples of Singlish. Singlish is most well known for the use of the particle “lah” which seems to function like verbal punctuation. Some Singlish words have even made their way into international dictionaries.

Singlish has become quite a controversial topic here. Fans of Singlish argue that it is an important part of what it means to be Singaporean. Singlish can be heard from people of all ages, races and social classes here. Furthermore, through the inclusion of words from different languages it reflects the cultural diversity of Singapore. Having unique things that everyone can rally around are really important in developing a national identity and patriotism. As a very young and very diverse country, such things are not particularly easy to come by.

Despite their strong desire to develop a national identity and instil patriotism, the Singapore government is decidedly unimpressed by Singlish. They worry that if people use Singlish, they will not properly learn to speak Standard English, resulting in them being an embarrassment to the country. To counter this they launched a campaign called the Speak Good English Movement. This campaign includes language classes, books, websites, social events where Standard English must be used and forcing soap operas to have their characters speak better English. I’m not sure what to make of their current slogan, “impress, inspire, intoxicate.” Maybe Standard English is sometimes impressive but intoxicating? It would seem that despite the government’s efforts Singlish is not going anywhere in a hurry. It still gets used a lot, and not just in informal social settings ether. It even gets used in public manners campaigns! (see included picture)

One thing that has happened repeatedly here is people incorrectly guessing my nationality on the basis of my accent. When people meet me they often guess from my accent that I'm Canadian, British, Kiwi or occasionally American. I even had a Canadian think i sounded kinda Canadian. Having grown up in a quite mono-cultural town it is not as though i had many chances to pick up a foreign accent from anyone. Maybe it was my years of singing in a choir that messed with my accent.

Then there is actually understanding what I'm saying. Despite me trying to speak clearly some people just still don't understand. This leads to some awkward moments. One of these was when coming out of a concert i tried to ask the security guard where the bus stop was. He thought i was trying to get more free drinks passes and got a bit annoyed. When i had swine flu it was especially bad because my accent was getting muffled by a facemask.

The other issue with being understood is that some words that are quite common in Australian English just aren't used here. Sometimes it is because a different word would be used here, sometimes it is because the cultural concept just doesn't exist in Singapore. One such one that doesn't exist here is bogan. I have asked Singaporeans here and Singaporeans living in Australia, none of them can come up with a suitable Singaporean equivalent word. I can't explain it with the aid of Australian movie or TV characters because unlike many places, Australian TV shows featuring bogans have not made it here. Sometimes people understand the American term "redneck" but even that doesn't quite capture it. It feels really weird to have to make a long winded explanation to communicate a concept that takes one word back home.


Wikipedia article explaining the word bogan

Only one week until I take the first flight of my trip. How time flies! It is hard to believe it really is so close.

I'll have to start packing in the next few days. Not sure how I am going to go with remembering everything I need and fitting it into my baggage allowance. Annoyingly Asian clothing sizes don't tend to fit me so I have to pack all the clothes I will need rather than buying them there. Then there is remembering all the right paperwork- passport, visa, banking, enrollment, accommodation, insurance.....It is amazing how much paperwork is needed!

I have been trying to brush up on my Asian language skills. It would be over two and a half years since I have used any significant amount of Indonesian or Malay. I only ever took classes in Indonesian but due to the similarity of Indonesian to Malay, I can understand some Malay too. I have been pleasantly surprised by how much I do still remember. Can't say the same about my Mandarin Chinese skills. It is only 7 or 8 months since I've finished lessons but my skills have slipped badly. I look at characters and know I once learned them but have no recollection of what they mean. That is really frustrating. It is such a difficult language for an English speaker to learn!