Deaf Experience translated to Hearing Experience
You go to a play, on Broadway, no less. The play is in Russian, but that’s alright, the bill for play assures people that the show will be interpreted in English. But... the interpreter’s English doesn’t seem quite right. The words sound right, but the order in which they say them is very confusing. Luckily, you manage to understand bits and pieces of what they’re saying. But not all of it. Well, you didn’t understand most of it, honestly. After the show, your Russian friends just won’t shut up about how amazing the play was. You play along and pretend you understood everything they did.
Look! It’s the latest film with Chris Pratt - one of the most anticipated movies of the year. You go to the theatre at midnight with a group of your friends. Unfortunately, the theatre is showing the movie in Punjabi. But that’s alright, you can use captioning devices during the movie. You arrive at the front desk, and ask for 6 captioning devices. They give three of you bulky, dirty glasses, with a box you have to wear around your neck. The other three, they give you long, twistable metal rods, with a screen at the top, and a bottom designed to fit in the cup holder. You find your seats, and set up everything so that you can have an enjoyable moviegoing experience. But two of the people with the glasses just can’t seem to get them clean. All three have problems getting the lenses to stay straight. All of them complain about the captions looking crooked. Everyone else stares. Why are they wearing those ridiculous glasses? They laugh and point at you. Those of you who have cup-holder captioning, one of the devices won’t caption. It just says “captioning device ready” on the screen. You turn it off, and on again. A menu pops up, asking you to press buttons A, B, or C to begin captioning. But there are no buttons on the device. You set it down on the seat next to you, unable to use it for the movie. Another person’s device is set for another movie, a sequel to 50 Shades of Grey. That most definitely is not the movie you want to be watching. You turn it off and set it down. The three of you huddle around the one person’s device that is working. It’s not the best setup, but it works. Five minutes in, people behind you start complaining and kicking your seat, telling you to put your device away, because the lighted words are distracting. This continues throughout the duration of the movie. The next day, you see people raving about how great the movie was, all over social media. You didn’t think it was that great. Your experience was pretty shitty. But you play along.
There’s a show tonight, with one of the funniest up-and-coming comedians in the world performing. You bought a ticket, for $45. Unfortunately, this comedian hails from Mexico, and they will be speaking in Spanish during the show. But that’s alright, you can get an interpreter, free of charge. You’re given noise-canceling headphones, and the interpreter has a microphone around their neck. Everything they say, you’ll hear in your headphones. The show begins. Ten minutes in, you have yet to laugh. But you’ve seen a lot of people laughing so far. Maybe it’s just a language difference. Or cultural. You wouldn’t find it funny, you don’t have the experiences of living in Mexico. You hear the interpreter say, “Then Johnny broke the ant crawling down his leg. Too bad it was his brother, Jeremy! The dress was very nice, but the owl set flame to the car.” The audience bursts into laughter. What was so funny about that? This comedian doesn’t seem very funny. Or maybe he is funny, since everyone’s laughing. Maybe it’s the interpreter. They probably don’t understand Spanish as well as they say they do. You want to leave, but you can’t, because you’re stuck in the middle of the row, close to the front. You can’t leave without everyone looking at you. You stare at the wall and daydream for the rest of the show.
