Digital Overtone

Living in a foreign language offers ample opportunity to reflect on language in general, much in the same way my concept and understanding of language and grammatical structures, before implicit, was highly enriched by my conscious study of Spanish. Despite the occasional aborted sentence or long, industrious pause (complete with complimentary furrowed brow), I am as confident in my ability to speak and to quickly assimilate new concepts as I am that the people who applaud said abilities add the silent suffix "…for an American," which alone means there is space to spare for improvement. Despite said confidence, I frequently stumble over prescribed, formulaic conversations (as those between a waiter and a customer in a restaurant), and I have been reflecting on why. The last two weeks here have been a fabulous demonstration of how reliant we are on speech formulas to dispense with small talk and other necessary business.

Formulas are useful because, in theory, they are universal and, as such, understood. "Understood" should here be understood (*cough*) as a double entendre: understood, as in comprehensible; understood, because they are implicit, scarcely need be spoken, and truly only are for the sake of convention. But they are no longer words. They become empty speech, the contours pronounced but lacking inside, and not just metaphorically: they become incomprehensible to the outsider. And they have become the bane of this traveler’s existence.

Not surprisingly, given my earlier example, I find myself stumbling more often than not in restaurants, tripping clumsily through forced interactions, speeches long since become formulas as natural and as enigmatic as breathing. "¿Le retiro?"—Can I clear your plates?—is spoken in a string of vowels. The Mexican need not even think to respond "que sí" or "que no." To him it is as natural as a musical cadence, lacking only the necessary resolution to be made complete. I spend my breath demanding "¿Mande?" until at last someone takes a moment, spares a thought, and the formula is again made speech, and I understand.

Formulaic speech is plentiful here, as, I imagine, in any languge. No thought is spared saying "a sus órdenes," "¿eso es todo?" "¿se le ofrece algo?" or "al contrario," (my favorite, the formulaic rejoinder for when one thanks you for providing a paid service). I snap them up one by one, as often as I can make people realize that a modicum of fluency is not equivalent to the same degree of cultural telepathy.

Teotihuacán

Typical clouds during the temporada de lluvias (rain in the distance)

And then there are the phrases that just roll off the tongue, universally used and nevertheless easy to understand. Like "temporada de lluvias"—rainy season. Those three words are the explanation for why ever day threatens rain, and the sky is constantly populated with brilliant cloud formations like paintings, here blue, here white, gray, black, one moment showers, the next all sunshine.

Last day in Mexico City until the end of July. I leave tomorrow for Oaxaca, and leave with new friends.

Posted by Kyle / Mexico and language and personal and travel