Seanan McGuire (seanan_mcguire) wrote,
Seanan McGuire
seanan_mcguire
  • Mood: happy
  • Music: Jonathan Coulton, "Chiron Beta Prime."

In which ASL makes everything AWESOME.

Yesterday, I was demonstrating to a friend of mine (who finds my fascination with ASL charming, if odd) that I can now sign "Behold! For now I wear the human pants!" My grammar is a little wonky, but I'll be seeing Judi in a few weeks, so right now I'm just working on getting the signs committed to muscle memory.

A Deaf gentleman about my age saw me signing, and got very excited. He came over, and signed, "You know ASL?" (In the case of signs that I don't know myself, but whose meaning was evident from context, I'm including them to form actual sentences.)

I signed back "A little." Emphasis on "little."

He asked what I knew...so I showed him. Around the time I hit "working in a mine for our robot overlords" and "did I say overlords? I meant protectors," he started to look, well, dubious. Like there was a chance I thought I knew some ASL, when really, someone was messing with me.

Then I signed "The Turtle can't help you."

His eyes widened, and he proceeded to finger-spell "IT?" I nodded. He made an "S" sign, followed by a gesture like putting on a crown. I nodded again. He got even more excited, especially since now he knew I actually understood my messed-up assortment of signs. He had me teach him "robot overlords," and he taught me the sign for "weird."

ASL and Stephen King: bringing the world closer together. The best part is that, for once in my life, I can legitimately say that the Turtle did help us.
Tags: good things, in the wild, silliness, stephen king, wild adventures
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  • 62 comments
...go 2 levels up... Expand

apocalypticbob

February 19 2010, 16:44:55 UTC 7 years ago

I know very little ASL, but I have always found that making the effort endeared me to the people I was trying to talk to, and they were very patient, even if I was having to fingerspell a lot.

Trying counts for a lot. Connecting with someone over something (semi)obscure because you were trying is awesome like pie.

markbernstein

February 19 2010, 19:29:44 UTC 7 years ago

Trying counts for a lot.

Very, very true. When I was sent to Paris on business, I encountered almost none of the rudeness for which the French are supposedly famous. I think a big part of it was that in a shop or restaurant I would always start off with a bit of my high school French, then apologetically ask, "Parlez-vous Anglais?"

keristor

February 20 2010, 11:57:42 UTC 7 years ago

I was told that the most useful thing is to be able to say "Hello, I'm sorry that I don't speak more X, do you speak English?" in whatever language. And if you know (bits of) any other language you can suggest those as well, in case they know some of the same bits.

(Except with the Dutch, who will tend to switch to your native language and refuse to speak their own in your presence because you're a guest. Which is a lovely attitude -- the annoying thing is that they probably speak your language better than most of your compatriots...)

seanan_mcguire

February 21 2010, 19:40:33 UTC 7 years ago

...the Dutch sort of delight me now.