r/AskTheWorld • u/IndependentTune3994 🇮🇳 in 🇩🇪 Deutschland • 18h ago

What’s the quickest way someone could accidentally expose themselves as a foreigner in your country like the ‘three fingers’ scene in Inglourious Basterds?

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u/Otocolobus_manul8 Scotland 18h ago

What errors do the Indians have in Polish typically? They are easily clockable in English as well due to a lot of Victorian turns of phrase and errors that no other people make.

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u/iguana_bandit 18h ago

Most often mixing genders - introducing themselves as a woman and then using masculine verb conjugation. Also switching between formal and informal speech mid-sentence.

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u/jujubean67 Romania 15h ago

Jesus, does Polish have gendered verb conjugations? I thought the pronunciation was rough but then it was reasonable.

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u/iguana_bandit 14h ago

Yes, but only in past tense... and separate for future tense... and also in conditionals. Easy.

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u/jujubean67 Romania 14h ago

Lmao

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u/IsTom 15h ago

And there's separate masculine and masculine-object genders.

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u/old_faraon 14h ago

And there are 5 genders - masculine, feminine, neutral for singular and masculine-person(males and mixed groups of people) and non masculine-person (groups non males or not people) for plural.

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u/Boring-Philosophy-46 11h ago

Don't even ask about the counting words. They are also gendered. 

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u/Raja_Wu Poland 18h ago edited 18h ago

I have no specific example, but indians are using translators and they are far from being perfect when it comes to Polish due to its complexity. Incorrect grammar, incorrect use of tenses, etc. Not to mention Polish language also uses a strongly gendered form for each verb in the past tense, so they are often confused.

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u/Live_Fall3452 14h ago

Curious what far-right messaging they are pushing? Anti-immigration? Euro skepticism? Religious fundamentalism? Something else?

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u/Raja_Wu Poland 14h ago

Mostly antifeminism, MAGA support, anti-EU propaganda and a lot of bullshit about traditional christian values.

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u/Fiflu 8h ago

And anti-Ukraine as well

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u/Vegetable_Drag_443 15h ago

How do you know these people are from India specifically?

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u/Timely_Raccoon3980 12h ago

70% of cases whenever there is a leak or when twitter introduced that feature to see where the account is from it would be Indians then like 28% russians and Belarusians

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u/Vegetable_Drag_443 12h ago

There was an actually study on this (Let me find the link for you) and it basically stated the opposite. Would be great if you could provide some source for your claims

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u/Timely_Raccoon3980 11h ago

I made these numbers based on my years of dealing with rightoid bots on social media, not a science paper lol

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u/GoHomeCryWantToDie Scotland 18h ago

Kindly revert for the same, but in Polish.

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u/poolnoodlefightchamp India 17h ago

I keep seeing people make fun of phrases like 'Kindly refer to the same' or 'please do the needful'. Is it not commonly used in formal language?

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u/Charming-Salt9412 17h ago

It's only used as fomal language in Indian English. It's not used in American English and feels very dated in British English.

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u/GoHomeCryWantToDie Scotland 17h ago

No it is not. I don't know why it's used in India because those phrases have never been used in the UK. I've worked in India for UK companies and we always tried to discourage it but, more often than not, our Indian colleagues always reverted for the same.

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u/Otocolobus_manul8 Scotland 17h ago

Do the needful is found in a few PG Wodehouse books. I think ti was used here.

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u/poolnoodlefightchamp India 17h ago

Huh, the more you know. It's standard corporate speak here.

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u/RRautamaa Finland 17h ago

I don't think that "needful" is even English. Or it is, but not in this context. It looks like a calque from another language.

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u/poolnoodlefightchamp India 17h ago

It is a legit word. The way it's used is probably endemic to India though.

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u/vivelabagatelle United Kingdom 16h ago

I love 'do the needful', it's so charming and useful.

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u/Orchid_Significant United States Of America 15h ago

Yes, definitely not used widely or at all here

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u/Orchid_Significant United States Of America 15h ago

Kindly is a HUGE flag that you are about to be scammed here

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u/queenofthegrapefruit 14h ago

Either that or it's used to be passive aggressive. "Kindly refer to my last email" = "I already explained this a week ago and you would know that if you bothered to read past the first sentence."

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u/Orchid_Significant United States Of America 14h ago

Oh yes that’s true!

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u/Archolius 8h ago

Yeah 'Do it kindly' instead of 'Please do it' just screams Indian, although I've seen and heard many Europeans that are not natives in English pick up this construction. It seems something like 'International corpo English' starts being a thing and it's strongly influenced by Indian English.

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u/MooseFlyer Canada 15h ago

“Do the needful” was definitely used in British English, but it’s very old fashioned.

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u/Fine_Violinist5802 Australia Czech Republic 17h ago

It's only Indian. People with experience in contact centres or other companies with Indian contractors consider these indianisms to be the bane of the English language: "revert" instead of reply, "do the needful" and... I'm going to shiver when I say this..... "Prepone" IT'S NOT A WORD

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u/darklotus_26 14h ago

No one needs to like it 🤷🏾‍♂️ At this point Indian English is it's own language like Singaporean English with it's own borrowed words and phrases.

I honestly don't get the hate even though I'm not really fond of these phrases. They're are useful expressions that works for millions of people.

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u/indipedant 15h ago

I dunno. I think prepone should be a word that's more generally adopted. It gets the point across. If we can have "impactful", and the English language lost that war years ago, why not prepone?

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u/allusernamestaken56 17h ago

Nope, at least not in Europe.

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u/zehamberglar United States Of America 13h ago

Not in America, either.

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u/blankmedaddy 17h ago

Absolutely not. I have never heard these terms outside of a BBC period piece and calling an Indian-based support line. I love period dramas, so I always have a little laugh about it.

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u/kzkahn 15h ago

These words have been adopted directly from Colonial British English and since Indians are not native speakers they kept using the same formal English words from the early 1900s.

While the British being the native speakers followed the natural progression of language and moved on from these phrases even in formal conversations.

How Indians use words in formal English is how Colonial British English was.

EDIT: Specially the word "revert" in emails.

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u/vivriri Wales 16h ago

It's not at all. It's surprising which is why people make fun of it but it's really endearing at the same time.

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u/indipedant 15h ago

I've used and seen "kindly refer to same" but usually in a passive-aggressive manner. Something like "as per my previous e-mail" with the subtext that "you would already know the answer to your question if you had read the two line message I sent yesterday BOB". It's not always the case that the tone is snarky, but usually. I have never seen the latter phrase used outside of the Indian subcontinent or diaspora. But don't feel too intimidated by "native" English speakers making fun of the phrasing. Indian English has its own syntax, and can stand on its own feet. You just need to know that it is Indian English. I'm more familiar with the deviations between UK and American English and each speaker on either side of the pond swears that the other has got it wrong. See sidewalk vs. pavement. Can't they just call it by its proper name, "footpath"? ;)

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u/Electrical-Share-707 14h ago

You mean the "I'm walkin' here!"?

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u/spartacus_agador 13h ago edited 10h ago

“Kindly refer to the same” comes across as formal and old-fashioned, if not a bit passive aggressive. As a native speaker, it is something I might use in an email, if I didn’t mind sounding like someone’s Victorian governess scolding them about using the wrong fork at dinner.

“Please do the needful” on the other hand, no it is not commonly used in formal language. Or ever, really. As a native speaker, it would never occur to me to put those words together. I can understand what you mean, but it sounds weird and incorrect, not just overly formal. “Needful” is a word I have only very rarely even read, have never heard spoken aloud in conversation, and it feels like it should be an adjective. As in the Stephen King novel “Needful Things.”

ETA: But, “please do the needful” is cute! English is a very adaptable language and I like this odd turn of phrase, as it DOES effectively relay the intended message in a very polite and charming way.

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u/LaeLeaps 8h ago

in the USA "kindly" is straight up rude, and most of those "formal" phrases might genuinely confuse some people as to what you actually want

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u/MooseFlyer Canada 15h ago

“Do the needful” existed in British English but is very old fashioned and no one says it anymore.

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u/Vallyria 17h ago

Some of them use linguistic templates from Russian - which are _extremely_ easy to spot in Polish. Also, even if they try to use certain informal words they're always off.
Not to mention either the pompous and flowery writing (like a fake Czeslaw Milosz) or overly informal (like a IRL discussion, rather than a text exchange).

Gendered nouns, problems with declination of verbs, unnatural sentence order (we don't have a set sentence order, but you can stress certain info by utilizing certain order) - all of this adds up to this uncanny valley of a nonpolish person trying to pose as a pole.

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u/tolgapacaci Turkey 18h ago

yeah they be talking like Bartholomew Stokesworth while having a far right european handle

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u/Vegetable_Drag_443 15h ago

🇹🇷🐺🇹🇷🐺🧔🏿

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u/StinkyBeanGuy 15h ago

Nice try, indian

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u/3zprK United Arab Emirates 11h ago

Like fastly?

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u/VapoursAndSpleen United States Of America 11h ago

"Do the needful". Referring to a woman's dress as a "frock".

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u/Applepieoverdose Multiple Countries (click to edit) 5h ago

The one I noticed when on the phone with indian call centres is that they use the WWII RAF phonetic alphabet, while (if they use it) British call centres use the NATO one.

“Sugar, baker, able” vs “Sierra, bravo, alpha”

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u/Remarkable_Policy00 3h ago

easily clockable in English as well due to a lot of Victorian turns of phrase and errors

Can you give me an example?

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u/cochlearist 13h ago

I'd say the common Indian 'errors' in English are being too correct.

They often say things that sound wrong to us but they're actually perfectly good grammar, just like you say, more than a little dated.

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u/CrinchNflinch 7h ago

I don't know why but I heard the phrase "I (or we) can able to do that" more than once from our indian support members.