[continued from previous message]   
      
   to Spanish would seem to warrant at least a passing mention.   
      
   Stavans described riding in a taxi with an obviously Asian driver   
   who was having no difficulty communicating with the dispatcher in   
   Spanglish, reminding me of Neal Stephenson's SNOW CRASH with its   
   "taxilinga": "He overrides the warning buzzer, jams the stereo   
   over to Taxiscan, which cruises all the taxi-driver frequencies   
   listening for interesting traffic. Can't understand a f***ing   
   word. You could buy tapes, learn-while-you-drive, and learn to   
   speak Taxilinga. It was essential, to get a job in that business.   
   They said it was based on English but not one word in a hundred   
   was recognizable. Still, you could get an idea. If there was   
   trouble on this road, they'd be babbling about it in Taxilinga,   
   give him some warning, let him take an alternate route so he   
   wouldn't get [stuck in traffic]. Taxilinga is mellifluous babble   
   with a few harsh foreign sounds, like butter spiced with broken   
   glass." (Stephenson loved similes like Slovakian loves consonants,   
   the more jarring the better.) [-ecl]   
      
   ===================================================================   
      
                                        Evelyn C. Leeper   
                                        evelynchimelisleeper@gmail.com   
      
      
              Don't join the book-burners. Don't think you're going   
              to conceal faults by concealing evidence that they ever   
              existed.   
                                              --Dwight D. Eisenhower   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)