How to Talk When You Don’t Share a Language — Communication in the Field
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Communication, especially in a foreign country is a tricky thing.
Throw in a humanitarian crisis, whereby people from a variety of countries try to support a population of displaced people who come from an even wider array of countries, and communication instantly takes on a new dynamic.
Simple questions become lengthy conversations. Explanations of illnesses are mimed with varying degrees of exuberance, and anyone nearby who could potentially translate, even at the most basic level into English suddenly becomes your new favourite person. Whoever you are, wherever you are, being able to communicate is key and, though often complex, this ‘hurdle’ has been one of the biggest sources of joy for me from my time in the field.
One morning, we accompanied a young man, Youssef, to see a specialist at the Dunkirk Hospital. Navigating the foreign world of a French hospital as an English person, reminded me how alienating it is to feel lost and helpless in a situation you don’t understand. After three receptions, two waiting rooms and a wildly confusing ticket-dispensing machine, we seated ourselves in what we hoped was the correct location and waited for the young man’s appointment.
Typing away rapidly, brow furrowed in concentration, after a minute he handed it to me, encouragingly. Open on it was the Google Translate app.
As the time passed by, we become increasingly aware that his French was limited, English was difficult for him and my Arabic was absolutely non-existent. We sat, trying to while away the time in small talk, which seemed to grind to a halt once we’d covered whether I liked football, whether he liked football and that both of us were tired. Whilst trying and failing to explain that, though we had seen one doctor we now had to wait for another, Youssef suddenly jumped in his seat, waving his arms at me and grabbing his phone, grinning like the Cheshire Cat. Typing away rapidly, brow furrowed in concentration, after a minute he handed it to me, encouragingly. Open on it was the Google Translate app. I reached for my phone, and we began: me translating from English to Arabic, him vice versa.
There is something magical about opening a dialogue with somebody who, up until that point, you had been unable to communicate with. Suddenly, we were making jokes about the doctors that were walking by and chatting about how boring hospitals were, all without uttering a sound, aside from the occasional fit of giggles when one of us said something particularly witty. Back and forth, back and forth, we spent two hours talking, finally able to communicate with each other after the awkwardness of the previous hour.
At one point, Youssef finished typing in a message, and looked at me earnestly, tilting his phone screen my way:
“Thank you for waiting and being so patient.”
Replying that it was my pleasure, I realised in that moment, the different forms solidarity can take. Solidarity can be standing beside someone on the frontline of a warzone, or it can be protesting for someone else’s human rights. For us, solidarity was sitting, side-by-side, for hours on end, waiting, laughing and chatting.
Later he assures me that is learning English and getting better every day.
“In six months, I will speak good English.”
When I replied saying that, though I could make no promises, I hoped my Arabic would be better too, he wrote to say that, when that day arrives, we will finally be able to talk without Google Translate.
That afternoon with Youssef was just one example of ingenious methods of communication I’ve witnessed in Calais. Upon asking one Ethiopian minor why he needed to go to the doctor, he promptly replied saying: “Guitar”. Perplexed, and assuming I had misheard, I asked him again, only to get the same response.
Utterly bewildered, I asked, apologetically, one more time if he could explain what was wrong. By this point, he and all of his friends are crying with laughter, finding my confusion hilarious. Finally his laughter subsides and he says “Guitar” one more time and, just before I begin to tear out my hair, he begins to mime playing the air guitar, moving his hand up and down his raised arm, in a strumming/scratching motion and all of a sudden it clicks: Scabies.
Later that day, the same group of kids are asking me name. “Charlotte”, I reply. They try to say it, stumbling over the strangely-placed ‘r’, and the harsh ‘t’ at the end. Frustrated, they keep trying, grumbling that they can’t get it right when, all of a sudden, one of them beams at me, shouting “Sherr-it” which, with a rolling ‘r’, bears an uncanny resemblance to my name.
All the others got it instantly and proceeded to pronounce it near-perfectly themselves. Not understanding what had happened, I ask what it means. One of the kids nudges me, pointing to his phone, at the name of an app on it: “Share It”, the app reads. From that moment on, cries of ‘Share It’ across the distribution points has signalled to me that one of the kids is nearby, and to expect their grinning faces to appear shortly. Needless to say, each time I hear it, I melt a bit inside.
Communicating is something I had always taken for granted until moving to France. Talking with friends, buying groceries, accessing medical care was something I had always done without second thought, but when you are confronted with a situation whereby you have to speak with someone for whom English is their third, fourth, fifth language, you are swiftly reminded of the privilege you have, having a mother-tongue that is so widely spoken.
The resilience and patience that I have experienced from displaced people in Calais is breath-taking. We might not all be able to speak Arabic and Pashto, Tigrinya and Amharic, but everyone can make the effort to communicate, in whatever way possible.
Everyone you meet has the potential to teach you new things, to make you laugh, to show you a deeper meaning of the word ‘kindness’, and that is something which we should all be grateful to experience.
Right now in Calais, we desperately need your support to continue helping people in need. Whether it’s through fundraising, volunteering or donating, please take action today to make a difference.
