July 4, 1999
...And That's
My Opinion©
By Sandy Goldman
The Rogers Park Community Curmudgeon
Learn or
Burn!
"Well, if that isn't
something!" said my friend Hing.
I've known Hing for several years. He
owns a chain of retail dry cleaning stores with a prosperous wholesale business
also. Hing is a good, stable citizen, active in his community. Hing is Korean.
During the Korean War when he was a young
boy he was, as he describes it, a hustler. He would run errands for the G.I.'s.
You know ¾ coffee, drugs and dames. His agility in getting in
and out of army camps was both baffling and amazing. Sometime between then and
the time I met him, he came to America. He never told me when or how.
In Korea he learned a few English words ¾
"Papa-San, Mama-San, Boss Man, and American dollar." His
vocabulary was also par-excellence in profanity proficiency.
"So what are you so excited
about?", I asked.
"This", he said, holding back
his proficiency. "Some organization in Edgewater wants to provide, at
every meeting, an electronic translation system similar to that at the United
Nations - and they are getting a $40,000 grant from the State of Illinois. Can
you imagine?"
"Well," I said, "it's a
way to make sure that all people are informed."
"No," Hing responded,
"It's a way to influence their lives; it's a way to tell them what to
think; it's a way to get their vote. It's a way to corral bodies for public
meetings to express the organizations' views and to push them into public
demonstrations."
"Don't you see?" he continued,
"It's like when I was a go-fer for the G.I.s, if one of them spoke
Korean, I believed everything he said ¾ until I figured out
that just because it was bigger, a nickel was not worth more than a dime."
"Isn't that a little hard?" I
responded.
"No! No! No! It only makes it easier
for people not to learn English. You cannot get ahead in America if you cannot
speak and understand English! When I came to America, I soon learned a new word
¾ job. I also learned that the connection
between this new word and the word I knew ¾ dollars, was
English. You cannot walk over the bridge without it."
"Here's what it's about", he
continued never losing his breath, "Do you want to wash dishes at some
Oriental Restaurant on Argyle, or do you want to eat at some Oriental
Restaurant on Argyle? Do you want to peddle ice cream or do you want to
manufacture ice cream? Do you want to wash windows or make windows? Do you want
to clean houses in the suburbs or do you want to live in a house in the
suburbs?"
"But", I interrupted,
"This may help them learn English."
"No, Sandy", he responded,
"you're listening but not hearing. It will only help those who know the
language. It will deter those who do not. Like so many other bi-lingual
programs, it will make it too easy to maintain the status quo. There are many
programs in the public school for foreign speaking immigrants to learn English ¾ and
in many cases they have teenage children who can help them. At a cost of up to
$125,000 per translator system, it would be better to set up learning centers
to 'teach the people how to fish' as the proverb goes."
"But it's not easy", I said.
"You're right, but it's the only way
¾ if people are to be free to chase the great American
dream; to win or fail on their own, unencumbered by the translations of others
whose motives may be suspect."
"But there are hundreds of different
languages. America is the great melting pot!" I said.
"Yes, but if you're too close to the
bottom of that melting pot, for too long, you'll get burned!", said my
friend Hing.
...And that's my opinion.
And I'm Sandy Goldman
Send
me your e-mail address or those of others who would be interested and I'll add
them to my rapidly growing distribution list.
To Email Me: smgoldman@ameritech.net