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<blockquote data-quote="Marguerite" data-source="post: 277629" data-attributes="member: 1991"><p>I get the giggles when watching Oprah interviewing various Aussies and they SUBTITLE them! She had Dr Catheine Hamlin on her show talking about te Fistula Hospital in Ethiopia, and although Dr Hamlin's accent is very cultured English, the show subtitled everything Dr Hamlin said. It made me realise - Oprah would need to subtitle the Queen, or Sarah Ferguson - any of the British aristocracy, in fact.</p><p></p><p>As for this supervisor, if you ever walk past tat store just start singing, "Show me the way to Amarillo..." (Bobby Goldsboro, wasn't it?)</p><p></p><p>We don't get busloads of Spanich-speaking illegals, instead we get boatloads arriving from Indonesia, usually on leaky boats. Most of them get intercepted well before landfall, which frankly is a lot better for them, than succeeding in getting to the Aussie coast. Making landfall on the north of Australia away from any major cities (ie away from Darwin - nothing else there) would be very dangerous indeed. Our most venomous snakes are in the north along with a lot of other venomous nasties, plus saltwater crocs. They're like alligators with ADHD and more teeth.</p><p></p><p>Hmm... maybe there is a reason why our salties in the north are getting so very big and fat...</p><p></p><p>Seriously though, a lot of the asylum seekers are really desperate. They would have to be. I wish the governments of the world would pool resources to help them and not simply try to ignore the problem, or prosecute. We can't have too many coming here because we haven't got the infrastructure to handle the numbers; but surely around the world we could help? Especially given with a lot of countries, we're part of the problem because we've allowed the unrest in their country to continue.</p><p></p><p>The most commonly-needed language in Australia (other than English) is Japanese. We're on the same meridian (more or less) as Japan, which is one reason we get so many tourists here. We've housed a number of exchange students in our home also. We increasingly have ghettoes (thnaks to uncontrolled immigration and lack of infrastructure) and in those suburbs, shop signs are NOT in English. But despite all this, I have NEVER experienced what you did. The worst I've experienced was in an Asian food shop and the shop clerk was totally ignoring me and only serving Chinese-appearing customers. I had a friend with me who is Chinese-Australian; she doesn't speak Cantonese but a more obscure dialect and is rusty with it. Her English is faultless but they still served her and ignored me. When the shop clerk realised my friend was not responding in Cantonese, the rudness was directed at her also, as if she was a traitor to her race by not speaking the language.</p><p></p><p>This happened ONCE. I shop in these areas all the time. Even shopping in Middle-Eastern shops, I have never had any problems. Only friendliness and politeness.</p><p></p><p>Your shopkeeper supervisor needs to have a trip Down Under and be accommodated in Merrylands or Lakemba, where we have two ghetto cultures clashing, neither of them English-speaking. Again, I've had no problems there, we bought easy child 2/difficult child 2's wedding fabric there and the staff of all the shops were helpful and friendly. But to a xenophobe, it's a scary place.</p><p></p><p>At least there was no Spanish!</p><p></p><p>by the way, along with a wide range of other languages easy child learned Spanish in primary school (and therefore so did I, at least a little).</p><p></p><p>Marg</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Marguerite, post: 277629, member: 1991"] I get the giggles when watching Oprah interviewing various Aussies and they SUBTITLE them! She had Dr Catheine Hamlin on her show talking about te Fistula Hospital in Ethiopia, and although Dr Hamlin's accent is very cultured English, the show subtitled everything Dr Hamlin said. It made me realise - Oprah would need to subtitle the Queen, or Sarah Ferguson - any of the British aristocracy, in fact. As for this supervisor, if you ever walk past tat store just start singing, "Show me the way to Amarillo..." (Bobby Goldsboro, wasn't it?) We don't get busloads of Spanich-speaking illegals, instead we get boatloads arriving from Indonesia, usually on leaky boats. Most of them get intercepted well before landfall, which frankly is a lot better for them, than succeeding in getting to the Aussie coast. Making landfall on the north of Australia away from any major cities (ie away from Darwin - nothing else there) would be very dangerous indeed. Our most venomous snakes are in the north along with a lot of other venomous nasties, plus saltwater crocs. They're like alligators with ADHD and more teeth. Hmm... maybe there is a reason why our salties in the north are getting so very big and fat... Seriously though, a lot of the asylum seekers are really desperate. They would have to be. I wish the governments of the world would pool resources to help them and not simply try to ignore the problem, or prosecute. We can't have too many coming here because we haven't got the infrastructure to handle the numbers; but surely around the world we could help? Especially given with a lot of countries, we're part of the problem because we've allowed the unrest in their country to continue. The most commonly-needed language in Australia (other than English) is Japanese. We're on the same meridian (more or less) as Japan, which is one reason we get so many tourists here. We've housed a number of exchange students in our home also. We increasingly have ghettoes (thnaks to uncontrolled immigration and lack of infrastructure) and in those suburbs, shop signs are NOT in English. But despite all this, I have NEVER experienced what you did. The worst I've experienced was in an Asian food shop and the shop clerk was totally ignoring me and only serving Chinese-appearing customers. I had a friend with me who is Chinese-Australian; she doesn't speak Cantonese but a more obscure dialect and is rusty with it. Her English is faultless but they still served her and ignored me. When the shop clerk realised my friend was not responding in Cantonese, the rudness was directed at her also, as if she was a traitor to her race by not speaking the language. This happened ONCE. I shop in these areas all the time. Even shopping in Middle-Eastern shops, I have never had any problems. Only friendliness and politeness. Your shopkeeper supervisor needs to have a trip Down Under and be accommodated in Merrylands or Lakemba, where we have two ghetto cultures clashing, neither of them English-speaking. Again, I've had no problems there, we bought easy child 2/difficult child 2's wedding fabric there and the staff of all the shops were helpful and friendly. But to a xenophobe, it's a scary place. At least there was no Spanish! by the way, along with a wide range of other languages easy child learned Spanish in primary school (and therefore so did I, at least a little). Marg [/QUOTE]
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