Tuesday, July 7, 2009

Back from Durban

I had quite a trip and have been neglecting my Blog, as well as Wordcraft. It was mostly a work trip, but it's always nice to see differences with people and language. My colleague and I were noting all the differences in pronunciation, like "schedule" and "process," but our Canadian (or maybe Australian, I don't recall...or even maybe Scottish) colleague pronounced "mandatory" as man-DA (as in "dad")-tory. Wow! It was a good thing the word was on a powerpoint or we never would have figured it out!

Then there was this woman (I really can't remember where she was from) who just wouldn't quit! First they gave us a yellow light, which meant we have 5 more minutes. Then a red light...meaning STOP! When our speaker got the red light, she just kept going. Finally the moderator said, "You really must stop now," but she kept going! The man running the powerpoints finally put up a blank screen, and the speaker seemed rather annoyed but finally stopped. However, she then had the audacity to say, "Any questions?" The moderator was extremely annoyed by this point and said, "You have taken up all your time! Sit down!" The speaker went back to her seat, mumbling all the way. Funny! I made sure to keep on time!

4 comments:

A Cuban In London said...

Some people, huh? That woman just loved the limelight!

Greetings from London.

Kalleh said...

Precisely! And she had no perception whatsoever.

Cat Herself said...

I can't even imagine the arrogance of thinking that no one else's schedule makes a difference! Was her topic really that much more important than all the people she was inconveniencing? I wonder how conferences get done in her country . . . maybe it's the norm there?

Anyway - glad you had a good trip - will you be posting pictures?

Kalleh said...

I've been very negligent of my Blog. That will change!

I believe our dear speaker was American (doesn't it figure?). Her report was surely no more important than the rest of ours. She was just a clod.

I hope to post some pictures soon. Thanks, Cat!