Top 5 Mongolian Language Bloopers

Let me tell you a little chestnut about my lingua franca:

I live in Manila but I grew up in one of the islands in Visayas region so we spoke like about three (3) languages and dialects at home.  When I started to work, I learned another three (3) dialects. So that makes 6 including English. I went to HK and I picked up Cantonese from my office mates and friends.  Now I am a Mongolian language student.

Amazing how every person of my experience manage to clear the decks with every people they run into, and they're not even confused or mixed up! I really do admire those people. And I hate to admit that I use a combi of two or three languages in a conversation, even in a short sentence like:

Ate, tubagin mo na kasi yung phone mo. 

(Sis, can you just answer your call)

or

Buti tama yung pinag-baruung-an natin.

(Good thing we turned right appropriately)

See what I mean. So for the reason of pure buffoonery, I collected my friends' and my own experience about my mongolian language havoc and I want to share it with you. It should be more funny when I share it personally but yeah, imagine it's me telling the story. 

5. The Cyrillic Mania

A friend asked her newly arrived friend from the Philippines to read one of the sign along the street. The sign is very similar to what's written on the picture below:

Photo Courtesy of www.tochinaandbeyond.com

With conviction she brashly answered, "PEKTOPA!"

A-huh. That word is actually in cyrillic letters which literally pronounced as RESTORAN. Yes, it's a Russian/Mongolian Word for Restaurant.

The same thing happened to me. It was only like three weeks since I came to Mongolia and there's a fellowship I had to attend to. I wrote some SMS to a friend so she can send some directions and told me to turn left right after the supermarket with a green sign that says NATUR.

After several minutes of searching and I really couldn't see what she had told me, I finally gave up and called. "WALANG NATUR SUPERMARKET, HATIP ANG NAKIKITA KO." (I couldn't find Natur Supermarket, I only see Hatip)

It's HATIP, right?? Oh Well.

4. Oops, Sorry oops, Sorry oops

So we visited a friend in a country side and upon meeting her family, we saw her mom outside their ger (Mongolian traditional house). I flashed my biggest smile and released this never-before-heard greeting:

"Oochlarai!"

(Sorry!)

My friend, wondering what we did wrong, realized that I am possessed by an unknown anti-language force ardently greet the family properly. That's the only time I realized I was saying the wrong term. Oh my. Shame.

3. Do you mean, hair? or water?

A friend told me another true-to-life story. A bald-headed expat went to cafe to buy some drinks. Wanting to practice his Mongolian language, he went to the cashier and asked:

Чэвэр шинэ ус байгаа уу?

Chewer shin uus baigaa yuu?

(Do you have a clean, fresh water/ bottled water?)

[Hair is also uus in Mongolian, only it is spelled үс instead of yc and yes though they both use letter Y doesn't mean they're the same. They have a slight difference in pronunciation although I don't recognize it that much.]

The lady, thought of clean, fresh hair looked at the man's hair and replied in shock: 

Бахгүй.

Bakwei.

(None) 

Since the man saw that they indeed have bottled water forcefully answered,

байгаа!

Baigaa!

(You have it!)

And the series of nope-we-don't-sell-it-yes-you-have-it continued. Just imagine.

2. Da Who

We went to this grocery store near our apartment to buy some food when a friend was considering to buy this pair of socks. Wanting to brag my Mongolian language expertise I boastfully asked the sales lady,

Ene hen be?

(Who is this?)

Confused, the lady said, "Ha?" Beyond shadow of doubt I asked that question once again still in a very confident manner:

Ene. Hen. Be?

"Who is this" pair of socks. I wanted to just hide forever in a blanket at my room after realizing it should be, "Ene hed we?" instead. Geez.

1. Happy To Serve!

Our friend decided to visit the black market for some shopping experience. Upon walking, she accidentally stomped the foot of this big, terrifying Mongolian man. The man kept on talking but she hardly understood. Frozen and terrified, she looked to the man slowly from his feet to head and said her winning line:

Bayarlalaa.

(Thank you)

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Memes from memegen.com