I asked some of the other teachers at KTV where I'm teaching English how I would find Vietnamese classes to take. They all looked at me like I was from another planet & asked "Why would you want to do that?!" Hm.
Okay, so I decided to take my own advice & use my surroundings as my language lesson. I took the room service menu at the hotel & my Vietnamese dictionary (courtesy of my friend Scott W. - thanks, Scott!), & set to deciphering it. I think I got most of it, except two things: "beef butt" & "buffalo thing", both under the beverage column. I must have gotten an accent wrong!
Next task: the headlines in the newspaper.
4 comments:
For some reason I am now craving a frosty, refreshing glass of buffalo thing.
I wonder why.
No one was interested in learning Vietnamese?!! Holy cow! To me that's the whole point of this adventure in the first place!!!
I would think it would be very difficult to teach English in Vietnam if you didn't know Vietnamese. Or do the students you instruct already have some basic English knowledge, making it possible for you to communicate with them in that language?
Ken: Most of the students that I am teaching already have a good foundation of English. However, it is quite possible to teach someone a language without using their native language. Think of how you learned English: lots of gesturing & repetition!
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