Languages

I watched the Obammercial on Univisión to see what good a job they were going to do in translating the thing. Well, I have to give them a B- in Spanish (and honestly, I really should be harsher but am giving them that for effort) and an A- in English.

But let me start with the actual task at hand.

I think Obama knocked it out of the park for fulfilling the first commandment in Marketing and Advertising : Thou shalt never mention your opponent when you're selling yourself.

The video was an iteration of the a documentary they showed at Denver's Invesco Stadium the day Obama delivered his acceptance speech. In between speakers they would show 2-3 minute clips about his life and his policies much like it was done tonight.

Just as he did in Denver, tonight we saw Davis Guggenheim weave Barack Obama's life with the life of the people he is looking to serve. The working mother with not enough food in the fridge. The elderly couple caught in the hell of chronic illness and disability and dead-end yet necessary job at the local Walmart. The latina teacher with the extra job. The factory worker teetering on the brink of welfare. Obama hit the economy, education and most importantly health care while weaving people's stories to his own vicissitudes and accomplishments.

Nevertheless there's one not so small detail that's going to raise hell for Obama : He says in the video that taxes will be reduced for people making  200K and under. Meanwhile we've been hearing all along, especially after the last debate and in reference to "Joe the Plumber", that the threshold was 250K.

Then we have he 2 big elephants in the room : Gay Marriage and Immigration. He spoke of neither. This threw me off because I thought that he would maybe have a different ad for the Spanish broadcasters. So to see the same ad airing and nothing mentioned about the raids, the wrongful incarceration of people was disappointing.

Overall though, the infomercial was a job well done in trying to make a connection between him and voters.

Yet they proceeded to transliterate instead of translating the video.

Oy.

Here's what I twittered :

Props to Viggo-Works

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

Viggo Mortensen + Looking fierce + Carrying a sword + Speaking Spanish = Muchos doblone$$$.

I am going to go broke just in the amount of time spent at the movie theater, the need for extra panties and feminine hygiene products and maybe a ... ahem ... certain-kind of toy or two. With this movie, Viggo is gonna make a lot of people rich. Just in panties and .. ahem .. certain-kinds of toys, I can see a whole terciary market of Viggo-related goods.

Heh.

Ok, so we are obsessed with le headbutt.

My son has not stopped talking about it. His father is a man with no interest in sports. So my poor son has been stopping men, asking them if they saw the final game, if they saw Zidane and ask them why the hell did he do that.

It's like he's trolling for sports talk.

He's upset. He can't believe the captain, Le Capitain!, threw the World Cup away with a headbutt. He doesn't understand that maybe France was going to lose anyway but seeing France lose like that has him reeeeaaallly upset. This from the child who cried when both Brazil and Portugal lost to the frenchies.

So, after hearing him go to sleep asking yet again, "WHY DID ZIDANE DO THAT!" and with his baby brother yapping in the background, "Because he's a freaking idiot", I decided to get a clip of the cabezazo.

What I have found is a mini-treasure trove of linguistic soccer clusterfucking that proves that fútbol is not only biggest sport in the world, it is the only real world sport.

You are forewarned : The full post is BANDWIDTH SUCKING HEAVY.

Americans sometimes can't help but be the dumb, uneducated stereotype people have pinned on them all over the world:

[via No more Spanish inquisitions for U.S. - Yahoo! News]:

HAMBURG (Reuters) - Landon Donovan was listening to a Spanish question at a U.S. news conference on Monday and ready to deliver his answer in the language he speaks fluently before being stopped by a spokesman who told everyone to use English.

Midfielder Donovan has delighted Spanish-speaking media with his polished delivery in the last three weeks, as have other team mates who speak the language like goalkeeper Kasey Keller.

Donovan seemed as unhappy as the journalist by the sudden introduction of the English-only requirement.

"That's demanding," said Donovan, who then praised the journalist as he struggled to ask his question in English.

"Good English," said the midfielder.

Jim Moorhouse, director of communications for the U.S. team, said the decision not to take questions in Spanish, or German, during the conference was made to improve the efficiency of the briefings.

"We made the choice because time is of the essence," Moorhouse said.

"It was becoming too convoluted with Spanish and German. We wanted to make sure we got through all the English questions."

The U.S., who have one point from two matches, complete their Group E campaign by taking on Ghana in Nuremberg on Thursday.