A Language Mad Dash

Volunteering at the marathon today was fabulous. Tons of international runners, tons of language opportunities.

Me Discharging My Runner ID Check Responsibilities

I take my responsibilities at ID check seriously, so I check IDs quite fast. At one point today, I found myself interacting with athletes, in quick succession, in German, Spanish, French, Italian, and English—all within a span of about 120 seconds.

I didn’t get confused among languages. I am so excited about that! I just always wish my skills in each were better, is all.

So far at the expo, Italian has been the language where people seem to appreciate me the most. I believe I have read, and it has also been my experience, that Italy among European countries is relatively monolingual. So after crossing the Atlantic, making their way to their hotels, and slogging far west to the Javits Center, Italian athletes often seemed relieved not to have to speak English with me.

Runners Being Welcomed Multilingually

The NY Road Runners Club Has Good Signs

Now the Swiss, on the other hand, are another story. I am totally irrelevant for people from Switzerland, where multilingualism reigns.

Besides speaking various combinations of Italian, French, German, and English, several Swiss people I met today also speak Romansh, which is a language I know nothing about. Unfortunately, in the flurry of excitement generated by my nonstop examination of passports and driver’s licenses, I did not think to ask them to say something to me in it! A lost opportunity, alas.

Sometimes after looking at the language stickers on my shirt, Americans would pass me by, assuming I didn’t speak English. 

In a comment on yesterday’s entry, a reader, Ron, asked what the funniest volunteer experience is that I’ve had to date. Here’s the thing. A lot of this happens so fast, and the conversations are so quick, that not much funny stuff actually happens. People who have trained for 26.2 miles are in a relatively serious and often nervous frame of mind, so while there is good-natured teasing (from me, I mean), mostly they are just concerned about getting into the expo, getting their numbers, getting their goody bags, and eating a lot of pasta.

SPiN: A Ping-Pong Social Club! (In New York, They Think of Everything.)

While I was moving among languages today, I kept thinking of ping-pong. The experience reminds me of that. Light, fast banter, nothing too heavy, and constant movement, as more than 40,000 runners flow through Javits and get their stuff in just a few days.

Quite coincidentally, I did in fact end up playing ping-pong later tonight. I think it might have been only the second time in about 20 years. This was at an art opening held at SPiN, a ping-pong social club owned by Susan Sarandon.

It is amazing how ping-pong movements stay with you. Not quite like riding a bike, but close! I played a huge amount of ping-pong when I was a kid.

So it felt as though I was playing one form or another of ping-pong pretty much all day!