Don't Have a Cow

I was listening to my radio yesterday morning and heard something of interest I thought I would post about. Have you ever thought about something one sided and never tried to see it from the other side?

What this was about is how more and more when you place a help call to a manufacture like a computer company or maybe a telephone company or many others you are being connected with someone from another country such as India? Obviously this makes things a lot more difficult as the person on the other end just does not understand English and we can not understand them either. So we take an attitude with this individual and in the end we may or may not get any help. Please do not stop reading yet based on what was just said.

Over the many years I have worked in the computer field we have had two temporary programmers work with us that were from India. One had been here for a little while. The other person was here for at least several years. It was very interesting watching the culture clash. Both gentleman were very pleasant. One was a little more difficult to understand. His accent was certainly part of it but if you really worked at it and over time you could understand him. The other individual, the one that had been here in the United States longer, was much easier to understand. But here is where the culture clash came in.

It is not bad enough that you have to understand English which is a second or third language for them but they also need to understand how it is we use it. First off we are far from perfect in our own use of the language. But add to that the fact that we throw in from mighty interesting phrases and use words in such unusual ways.

To you and I we probably understand what someone is saying “I am so hungry I can eat a horse.” That is a strange little saying but it kind of gets a point across. This is mild colloquialism, there are things much worse than that. Sometime I want you to try something. Spend a day or even a part of a day listening to what you say and what others around you say. In particular pay attention to those off phrases where you know exactly what it said but, if your were new to this language you might not understand. Another example, there is more than one way to skin a cat. To you and I you may understand this to mean there is more than one way to solve something. To someone else what on earth did that person just say?

It is no wonder someone from India (or anywhere) might have a hard time understanding the way we use English. I know with Anesh (the programmer that had been in the US much longer than the other gentleman) we were always telling him what he really meant to say to help him out a little. It was at least a daily thing where he would come up with something that he obviously did not understand the way it was used. It is interesting however since it really helped me to be much more conscious about what I say and it helped me to recognize what I may have said that through someone off.

Anyway what this all started off with is think about the person on the other side of the phone when you reach someone from another country. While we are frustrated think of how it is for them. Call after call you have someone who is real rude on the other end of the line. Just as we have a hard time with their accent, think how it is for them. Just look at the difference in our own accents and colloquialisms between someone from the mid west (of course we do not have an accent), out east, down south, California (yes California is kind of unique in itself), etc. It is hard enough understanding someone else here in the United States let alone having someone from the outside understand us. Also the problems communicating is not fun for them either. You are talking people that are normally very polite having to deal with some very rude people. It has lead to a lot of depression amongst these people that provide the support. And just get over the fact that companies should be providing us help from people here in the United States. It is a changing world and it is not happening. Businesses are only interested in the bottom dollar and labor is just cheaper outside of the states.

OK, I have rambled on to much as it is. If you managed to read this I hope you take away at least one thing. I hope it will help make you just a little more conscious of the next person. I for one am very impressed that people function as well as they do in another culture especially here. We expect everyone to be just like us regardless of the fact that the majority of the world is not “like us.” If we could only get over our self there is so much more we can learn and we would be that much more richer for having experienced other cultures.