Teaching Tourists What To Say In An Emergency (I.e., The 'Universal' Word)...

You know, I was thinking. Of foreign tourists arriving for the first time in my country. And what important words they should teach them. Especially emergencies, big and small. I would say, the first thing you should teach them is

"Hey!!!"​

like that. Loud, and with whatever emotion is needed. Distress, if you need medical care. Or, if it's an urgent situation, like if a car is about to back into you.

Actually in that last situation, to say anything would be better than nothing. "Oh!" would save you from injury, because then the driver would at least know that someone is behind them. But in English-speaking countries, "hey!!!" is universal, for all forms of distress. And the emotion in your voice usually shows the problem.

The only problem is the phonetic pronunciation. In most other languages, the E has our long A sound. So you could teach it to a foreign traveler to an English-speaking country as "hé!!!" (notice the accent aigu).

Here, if you are hosting a foreign traveler or teaching tourists English in your country, you might want to copy what I just wrote:

"Hey!!!"
and
"Hé!!!"​

Then paste it on a big PDF document. And then hand it out like a brochure, just those two words. And post it everywhere someone who doesn't speaking English well might be. It literally might save their life some day.

 

If you know someone who speaks a foreign language visiting an English speaking country, teach him "hey!!!" for sure. It may save his life.

And. If there's an emergency, and you don't speak English, just call 911. The telephone number is always 911. And even if you hang up, in my country, they call that a 911 hang-up call. And the police will automatically send someone out to investigate. Unless, you explain it to the operator. Say "my mistake", for example, before you hang up. But, if you immediately hang up, they will at least send out the police in the US. (Unless that's changed.)

 

Oh man! Why didn't I think of that?!

I've been teaching foreigners to say, "Excuse me please, but I think there might be a problem here, thank you very much."

For some reason that has been confusing to them, and hard to remember, especially in emergency situations, and has made the problem worse, such as in the case of the young girl who could only remember the last part, 'thank you very much,' which she claims only encouraged the man who was raping her. I mean, that's her story, but...

Plus, not knowing English very well meant, they say, that it was slow for them to remember the whole phrase in the moment, and then get the words out as clearly as they could, at least, according to one guy from his hospital bed who was trying to warn a driver of a car he was in and was not paying attention as he swerved into an oncoming truck. He even suggested that the driver, paid even less attention to the road as he turned to this nonnative speaker and tried to figure out what he was saying for a full minute before the collision. But again, that is his story, I wasn't there, and he may not have remembered the events clearly.

Then they get confused about saying please and thank you in an emergency, so then I have to yell at them and slam my fist on their desk and say, "Hey! Do you speak English?! I am the one who speaks English here! You paid me $5,000 for this 1 hour English lesson! So shut the hell up and do as I say, thank you very much!" And then they usually understand in a cowardly sort of manner. And if not, I yell "Hey!" at them a few more times.

 

I taught a pair of German tourists how to greet new acquaintances here in the states: HOWDY, DIPSHIT. Worked quite well for them.