The Twisting of the Tongues

An Indian family was keen to view my property for a second time before they put down their offer to purchase. Mr. Mohan told me he would bring his brother along for the second viewing. When I opened the door, lo and behold, I was surprised to see not one, not two, not three but fourteen members of the family! I smiled for indeed it is very typical of Indians to be very co-operative and cohesive as a family. I understand them very well, because my best friends, Amudah and Mrs. Ram are Indians.

As I was walking towards the MRT, I remember my colleagues would have completed their project presentation at the Geylang Toastmaster Club. I smsed Vanessa, our Vice President for Education, to ask her who won the best speaker's prize for prepared speech. She replied, "Muar". Immediately I thought of "Muar", a town in Johore. I wondered if Vanessa was replying me in dialect. I kept mumbling the word, "muar" and trying to ascertain which dailect she was referring to. I gave up and smsed to Vanessa, "What is "muar". Sorry, don't understand you. Back came the reply, "Me lah. Alamak".

It was only after I had my dinner that it dawned upon me that Vanessa meant "me" in French. But it should be spelt as "moi". I smsed her to let know my realisation, and that she would make life easier for me if she had said, "C'est moi!" Vanessa told me that she did not realise that "moi" should be spelt as M-O-I which sounds like a girl's name in Hokiien dialect. When we say "ah moi" ("oi" pronounced as in boil) it means a young lady in Hokkien. Hence Vanessa spelt "moi" with Malay phonetics - m-u-a-r.

This incident reminds me of a question posed by one of our customers in Rialto some years back. While waiting for his food to be served, he smiled upon hearing me switch from one language to another; from one dialect to another while talking to customers. He asked, "Singaporeans speak so many languages and dialects. Don't you guys ever get confused?"

I assured him, "No, we hardly get confused." But hang on! We do sometimes and the above incident is a classic example of the word, "moi".

We are not afraid to make mistakes, for it is through mistakes that we learn to polish and fine tune our language. This is the fun we get from living in a multi racial country like Singapore. Aren't we a colorful nation? :-)

Gan Chau