Pidgin English

I was invited to lunch at ex-student Singaporean Linda’s, the other guests being two couples.  

    The conversation got round to the Malay and Indonesian languages being simple in structure with no conjugations, just adding “already” or “not yet” to the verb, rather like in Chinese.  For example:

to eat = makan; 

to have eaten = sudah makan / “already eat”; 

not have eaten yet = belum makan / “not-yet eat”.

    Irish Peter, who works for an oil company that has Filipino workers on their offshore rigs, said Filipinos use “already” a lot in English.  

    One day, the duty manager asked a Filipino worker to go and open a valve.  The Filipino came back and said, “Valve already open”.  

    This sent the duty manager into a bit of a panic, because this could mean: (i) “I’ve now opened it,” but it could also mean: (ii) “It was already open when I went to open it” — in which case, an oil leak situation, therefore serious.  Especially since it was an offshore rig.