Professor: "I am here on the North Slope recording a
bilingual caribou, who speaks a unique Eskimo dialect . . . Will you
illustrate, please?"
Caribou: "drzlyfumnpxksrccbggujalkr”
Professor: "Meaning?"
Caribou: “One o’clock”
Professor: "May we have another example?"
Caribou: “gxh.”
Professor: "Translated how?"
Caribou: “The place where two oceans meet in a
bay that goes inland through a purple fjord that turns pale and then not so
pale and goes on and on, in and out and then narrows somewhere but floods in
May and maybe part of June.”
Professor: "Any other expression, not so nuanced, that
we may be interested in?"
Caribou: “landscapeintruisionsinthenameofcivilizationalloverthespillspoiledplace
bypropernounsexxonandbritishpetroleumforimproperpurposes.”
Professor: "We can almost decipher that."
Caribou: " In plainer English: 'Men come now and
dig dig and pump pump and lay down big pipe and seep and soak the land with
poison, and may they go to blazes without taking us with them.'”
Professor: "Thank you very much."
Caribou: "You are not welcome."
Moral: Enough said.
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