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Immigraffiti
On Election Day last week, I opined that we might be a little too accommodating of folks who didn't speak English since signs directing people to 'Vote Here' were also in English, Spanish, Korean and Chinese.
Today I came across graffiti designed to inform me where Ely was. Where Ely was happens to be a subway platform. Hardly an achievement on the scale of, say, Mount Everest. And since I happened to be there too it wasn't all that impressive.
But what struck me was that Ely chose to deliver his message in two languages. Presumably so everyone from a Wall Street banker to an illegal immigrant from Honduras could know where Ely once was.
I admire Ely's gusto. I guess there's no stopping the multilingual juggernaut.
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Comments
But how will the people who only speak French, Chinese, Polish, et al, ever know that Ely was there? Such a sad world. ;)
Posted by: Ellie | November 14, 2003 6:08 PM
Couldn't he come up with a cute little graffitti cartoon of himself peering over a fence ( ala old Backyard Club in the Village). Or maybe just a witty "kilgore was here".
Posted by: Beantown Bwana | November 18, 2003 4:15 PM
maybe ely didn't translate it--maybe someone else offering public service did, which leaves room for the french, dutch, etc. versions. a long time ago, my friend's dad said that he thinks graffiti-ists should get the death penalty because in his mind, the drive bys start with graffiti, so in order to save lives, the death pentalty to all graffiti-ists. ouch.
Posted by: Anonymous | November 25, 2003 6:12 PM