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Language Silliness at Guts Soul
Meridel: I think we need another set of tongs.
Me: I agree. I'd say we could ask for them when the waitstaff come back, but I don't know how to say tongs in Japanese...
Meridel: Me neither. We could just point to them and ask.
[a little while later, she does so and receives another set of tongs]
[later on, I spill my coke all over and another waitress is helping clean it up]
Gabriel, in a moment of brilliance, to the waitstaff, in Japanese: Hey, what do you call these things?
Waitress: [look of confusion]
Gabriel: That is, we don't know the Japanese word for them.
Waitress, smiling: Tong.
Everyone: WTF.
(Note: Gabriel had actually looked it up on his cellphone, only to find the definition in Japanese to literally be "tool to pick up things", which seemed a bit ridiculous.)
Me: I agree. I'd say we could ask for them when the waitstaff come back, but I don't know how to say tongs in Japanese...
Meridel: Me neither. We could just point to them and ask.
[a little while later, she does so and receives another set of tongs]
[later on, I spill my coke all over and another waitress is helping clean it up]
Gabriel, in a moment of brilliance, to the waitstaff, in Japanese: Hey, what do you call these things?
Waitress: [look of confusion]
Gabriel: That is, we don't know the Japanese word for them.
Waitress, smiling: Tong.
Everyone: WTF.
(Note: Gabriel had actually looked it up on his cellphone, only to find the definition in Japanese to literally be "tool to pick up things", which seemed a bit ridiculous.)
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It's like that in French french also. In Quebec, we translate everything.