Does anyone here speak ‘Engrish’?

By Maiko Tanabe

'Engrish' is everywhere in Japan

My friend from Australia went to Japan this summer for a week and he admitted he didn’t know a word in Japanese and didn’t speak any while he was there.

And he told me about this language called “Engrish” and about his weird “Engrish” experience.

“Engrish” refers to broken English spoken or written by someone mostly from East Asia, he said.

He went to a restaurant for lunch, but he was a vegetarian. In Japan, it is really hard for vegetarians to find a place to eat. For one thing, vegetarian culture is not as popular as it is in North America. So he went in a restaurant he found.

The menu was written in Japanese, so he couldn’t read it, but it had pictures of each plate as well.

Yet, he couldn’t tell which plate had meat, so he pointed to a picture of a plate on the menu and asked a waitress if the plate used meat or not.

The waitress didn’t speak any English, so all he did was point at  the menu and say, “meat or no meat?”

She seemed to understand what he said. She shook her head with a smile and said, “no meat.”

Twenty minutes later, she came back with the same smile and with a plate of vegetables and big fish. For her, meat didn’t include fish.

He told me this story over and over and complained how she seemed to understand but actually didn’t understand what he said.

And now I wonder about this language called “Engrish.”

Is it a new language or it is as a result of misunderstanding and of lack of mutual effort to communicate?

Close enough?

My first language isn’t English, so the first thing I had to do since I decided to study in Canada was to learn English, how to speak, listen, read and write. And since it is so different from my first language, Japanese, I had a hard time learning it and am still struggling with it sometimes.

So I sometimes get jealous of people whose first language is English. It is not only because I am learning the language, but also because they don’t necessarily have to learn another language to travel to or even to live in other countries since English is a universal language.

You might not have to speak a word in another language when you travel or stay in another country even for more than a month, if you speak English. It would be nice to speak another language under the circumstance, but it would be optional.

I have been to Spain, Morocco, Italy and France and I didn’t have to speak any of the languages, all I had to speak was English and that was enough.

And if you go to Japan and don’t speak a word in Japanese, you can still live there. You might have some troubles, but who wouldn’t when you live in a different country?

Yet, you can still travel or even live in those places speaking English, not the other languages.

I have friends in Japan from other countries who teach English as a second language. Some of them speak Japanese well. Some know a few words like “hello” and “thank you.” But some know few words in Japanese and live there only speaking English even though they’ve been in Japan for more than a year.

But it’s still understandable. English is almost everywhere you go. You wouldn’t have to speak Japanese in the first place, especially if you are in big cities like Tokyo.

Everything is written and announced in Japanese and English. If you are at a station or on a bus or train, announcements are made in both languages and you wouldn’t get lost.

Yet, the fact that English is written everywhere doesn’t mean Japanese speak English. The truth is quite opposite sometimes. In fact, few people speak English there. It is written everywhere, but is rarely spoken.

And that’s probably partly how the new language, “Engrish” was born.

People who visit Japan from other countries usually speak English when they are in Japan. They ask questions and talk to each other in English.

But wouldn’t it be nice to learn the language of the country you are visiting?

That shows that you are actually interested in the country and are making an effort to communicate and to learn about the culture.

I once saw a guy with a tattoo written in Japanese, which means “post office.” I’m not sure if he knew the meaning or not.

One of my friends was once wearing a T-shirt that said “stupid” in Japanese. I asked him if he knew what it meant, he said he didn’t. He was wearing the shirt without knowing what it meant because it looked “cool.”

When my friends visit Japan, they tell me their weird “Engrish” experiences. They meet Japanese speaking “not-really-English” and see things written in “Engrish.”

But if they tried to speak Japanese while they were in Japan, they would have had different experiences. Another new language might have been born instead of “Engrish.”

Maybe, “Engrish” stands for more than just non-standard English spoken and written by people from East Asia. Maybe, it implies how efforts should be made for mutual understanding. It shouldn’t be just one way.

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Posted by Maiko Tanabe on Dec 24, 2009. Filed under Opinion, This Week's Edition. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.