Seems to me that it would be essential for God's messengers to know what words not to ever say.

It would also come in handy to distinguish a friendly prospect from an unfriendly one, would it not?

Crazy question, I know, and the very thought of that being taught is ludicrous.

But in the real world wouldn't it be wise to inoculate the elders before sending them out into the evil world?

no, this is stuff that is learned on-the-job during the first few weeks of door approaches

i used to write stuff down, and bought a killer dictionary to look them up

i would let them slip in conversations with members, feigning innocence that these words must be okay, because people at the door use them with us

There was one word I was told not to say in the MTC, but that was it.

They only warned us about one swear word, and that was only because missionaries would accidentally say it when trying to say the word for lemon. They didn't tell us that it meant "blowjob". ;)

Romanian?

Yup!

Do I know you? :o



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/01/2014 05:19PM by jdawg333.

Does my husband know either of you?

I met one missionary in Romania who had to go by his first name because his last name was the f-bomb in Romanian. No one told him until he landed in Bucharesti.

I was getting pretty good with spanish, but there was one investigator we had who I could never understand. Finally my comp told me it was because I didn't know all the swear words he used and he taught them all to me.

Before heading to the Philippines, they taught me the word for debt was "utang" but failed to mention that the word for nipple was "utong". I learned that after telling an entire family that the prophet has counseled us to avoid nipples. (Which I guess was technically true).

Nope but they learn it here pretty fast.... especially when they are in my ward. no problem we love to cuss and most mishs I met are going crazy to learn them too ;)

It would be wise to at least teach what innocent words might be mistaken for swear words. That could prevent accidental offense!

A REAL cognate is either very similar to , or identical to the same word in English. For example, how hard is it to figure out "la televisión" in Spanish?

BUT - false cognates can be treacherous, and I learned this the hard way in Mexico. I was trying to say I was "embarrassed" about something. But "embarazada," for those of you who don't know, means "pregnant."

Not all dirty words are false cognates. Many stand out on their own. I had a Spanish professor in Spanish 101 who spent an entire lesson on dirty words that Anglos might use in all innocence, so we would not accidentally look like idiots. And it was a good lesson, too. The prof was SUCH a serious guy that nobody dared to giggle, and BOY - did we learn to avoid (or use when appropriate) those dirty words!

Correct. :-) I'm not referring only to false cognates, but also to similar-sounding words in the same language. A simple slip of the tongue can cause you to say something with a very different meaning than what you had originally intended!

Exactly what I was thinking when I thought of this.

For instance, are the spanish speaking elders taught the nuances and perils of using a word like 'mother'?

Or the one that really cracks me up, 'huevos'.

OK, you want eggs or testicles, senor?

When they're similar to words you'll use, we were informed of the bad word, its meaning and to take care to keep the pronunciation right.

No, it does not include cuss words. When I was in the MTC, the language training barely included *words*! It was the most pathetic excuse for language education I had ever seen. I was already fluent in the language I was being "taught" there, and I was appalled at how weak and thin the language training was. No vocabulary was taught other than that which would be used in giving discussions and talking about the LDS church. Which, clearly, would be of no use at all if the person to whom one was speaking wanted to talk about something outside the limited topic.

I learned what the word for "fuck" is in korean, in the mtc. It is an easy one to say accidentally, so it was kind of a necessary warning.

Back in the 70's an American mishie in Australia told me that they were advised not to use the word "fanny". (Aussie slang term for female genital area).

Not officially but one of my MTC instructors taught us Swedish cuss words since he felt they didn't really mean anything to him. I kind of respected him for it.

When were you in Sweden?

Arriving in Australia during the Christmas season, my companion and I were invited to dinner at a members house. After feasting on the best meal I had eaten in a month, I pushed back my plate and exclaimed to Sister Member "That was good, I'm stuffed" You could hear the silverware drop and the kids giggling. My companion dropped his head and was laughing under his breath. No one had told me that in Australia the word "stuffed" means fucked.

I doubt that it does. I used the French slang phrase "casse-toi" to a TBM on another board, and got a delightful response from an ex-mo that went something along the lines of "I guess there are no French RMs on this board ... or at least none that picked up any Parisian slang during their time in the field."

It is somewhat offensive & irrelevant makes no sense...
Wherever I've been to learn a language (no religious, just survival) I barely survived to utter basic words, who cared about using "mierde" donnerwetter" "culo" "arshchloch" words, when the objective was to survive?

I would find it very offensive a new learner of my language using cuss words.
Plain stupid!!!

quinlansolo Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> It is somewhat offensive & irrelevant makes no
> sense...
> Wherever I've been to learn a language (no
> religious, just survival) I barely survived to
> utter basic words, who cared about using "mierde"
> donnerwetter" "culo" "arshchloch" words, when the
> objective was to survive?
>
> I would find it very offensive a new learner of my
> language using cuss words.
> Plain stupid!!!


A dumb Q is it bro q?

Excuse me if I have offended your fine Ex Mormon's sensibilities.

I had deemed it a worthy Q in light of the way they are setting these kids up to become laughingstock even when sent among nations that speak the mother tongue.

Witness the awkwardness of battlebruise's mission to Oz.

Seems to me a savvy MTC spanish tutor might save more than a few elders untold embarrassment by giving a heads up on the perils of saying pedo in lieu of perro (fart/dog).

I know the very idea would be a hot button issue amongst the bretherin, but whether official or un-, it makes sense to infuse the pedal pumping peddlers with some social sensibility, doncha think?

Thanks for contributing to the thread, btw. Your reasoned response has been as enlightening for me as any other so far.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/02/2014 01:57PM by Shummy.

As a missionary, there was a word I had encountered several times but couldn't make heads or tails of. It wasn't in the standard issue dictionary, and it looked like a loanword. So I wrote a letter to an investigator in a former area, asking her for a definition. She wrote back with an explanation and drawings.

Incidently, Google Image search for パイズリ is NSFW. (Does this board allow foreign characters?)

It's a strange experience to hear a word every day and have it sound completely normal and innocent, then have your companion tell you it's a bad word and for the rest of your life it sounds vulgar.

I wish they had taught at least some of the slang. In my first area in Brazil, I told the bishop of the ward that the other missionaries in the MTC would jerk me off. That's certainly not what I meant to say. I was trying to say they would make fun of me, not have fun with me.

Some of these communication breakdowns are pretty funny, especially Tapir's'

And they prove my point.

Is it really too unseemly and common sense for the Lard's language laboratory to recognize the need?

Stupid cult.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/02/2014 09:39PM by Shummy.