Ben Wheatley Quotes

Stick." I said in Russian. I had no clue what the word for stake was. I pointed at the silver ring I wore and made a slashing motion. "Stick. where?" He stared at me in utter confusion and then asked in perfect English, "why are you talking like that?

Most of our life is miscommunication, and when you add a language barrier to it, it just becomes total mayhem and confusion... It just adds to it with all of the cultural differences. It could be an American family meeting another American family and you could still have a total clash. With family, it's like visiting another planet.

I actually don't understand a word Paula's saying anymore. It's like a new language.

Your people I do not understand, so to you I shall put an end, and you'll never hear surf music again.

If we go on explaining we shall cease to understand one another.

Not understanding anything is terrible, because I communicate very much in my real life.

My first modeling job in Paris, the photographer said, 'Tue es belle,' which means, 'you are pretty,' and I thought he said, 'Tu es poubelle,' which means, 'you are the trash can.' I burst into tears. He was not happy about that.

The worst mistake of first contact, made throughout history by individuals on both sides of every new encounter, has been the unfortunate habit of making assumptions. It often proved fatal.

In Japan, you have no idea what they are saying, and they can't help you either. Nothing makes any sense. They're very polite, but you feel like a joke is being played on you the entire time you're there.

What Thucydides said of the Greeks at the time of the Peleponnesian War applies to us at present [1860]. The Greeks did not understand each other any longer, though they spoke the same language; words received a different meaning in different parts.

We were like deaf people trying to dance to a beat we couldn't hear, long after the music actually stopped.

There,” she said triumphantly. “Like that.” He began to wonder if they were speaking the same language. “Like what?” “That! What you just said.” He crossed his arms. It seemed the only acceptable reply. If she couldn’t speak in complete sentences, he saw no reason why he had to speak at all.

The most embarrassing one is that I had no idea - and please excuse me - that you guys call a condom a rubber. My version of a rubber is an eraser. I've done that - very loudly asked for a rubber and people have given me strange looks. That was embarrassing!

The surest sign that two people no longer speak the same language is that both say ironic things to one another but that neither senses the irony.

Actually this is really funny - one time she accidentally forgot to leave a note and I had no idea she had even moved. I was living in the house with a beautiful Mexican family for three months before I realized they weren't my cousins visiting from out of town. They were so nice. They called me "Quien es, quien es," which I thought was a beautiful name.

The trouble was that he was talking in philosophy but they were listening in gibberish.

The most basic barrier was language itself, very few Americans in Iraq whether soldiers or diplomats or news paper reporters could speak more than a few words of Arabic. A remarkable number of them didn't even have translators. That meant for many Iraqis the typical 19 year old army corporal from South Dakota was not a youthful innocent carrying Americas good will, he was a terrifying combination of firepower and ignorance.

It's dreadful what little things lead people to misunderstand each other.

When one man speaks to another man who doesn't understand him, and when a man who's speaking no longer understands, it's metaphysics.

Are you two having some sort of strange human thing that you can’t follow what I’m saying? (Simi)

Your saying 'I do not understand you' is praise beyond my worth, and an insult you do not deserve.

Two nations divided by a common language.

A false or misunderstood word may create as much disaster as a sudden thoughtless act.

i couldn't speak the language of his feelings

This time I m not going to tell you a story. I'll just say that insanity is the inability to communicate your ideas. It's as if you were in a foreign country, able to see and understand everything that's going on around you but incapable of explaining what you need to know or of being helped, because you don't understand the language they speak there.