Back with me again, after talking about the situations in the Netherlands, Spain, and the United Kingdom, the #AcrossTheGlobe series has come to an end for now. In the latest Instagram Live, Elisa invited her friend, Diana, to talk about the situation in Canada. Diana is an Indonesian who currently works in Toronto as a UI Developer and has lived in Canada for 11 years.
According to the government, coronavirus cases in Canada have reached 40,179 (as of Apr 22, 2020 7pm local time)–and one of them is the wife of the Canadian Prime Minister, Sophie Trudeau. Thankfully, like Boris, she recovered after 14 days.
All right, without further ado, let’s take a look on the latest info on coronavirus from Canada below!
Lockdown or PSBB in Canada?
Good question! Diana shared to us that it’s not technically a lockdown in Toronto. It looks like Pembatasan Sosial Berskala Besar (PSBB) in Indonesian–such as but not limited to banning large gatherings, doing physical distancing, and restricting a number of people inside a grocery store. When I checked the news, Toronto Mayor John Tory said on a statement that “there’s no end to the lockdown yet“. This means people don’t know when the lockdown will end, and the local government takes measures very carefully for safety.
Furthermore, the Canadian government started a program where they’re providing emergency benefit to the people affected by Covid-19. Those affected people are mostly those non-essential workers, such as but not limited to retailers. And yes, it’s legit: the government transferred the notes sent to their bank account–which is similar to the grants given by the British government.
Introducing Canadian English
We’ve previously talked about British English and many articles discuss about American English too. How about Canadian English then?
There are some vocabulary that are distinct to the English used in Canada (yep, jadi Bahasa Inggris di Kanada sedikit lebih berbeda dibandingkan British, ataupun American) we’ve discovered during the live, such as:
- COP: If you want to look for “polisi in English,” you might remember there’s police. There’s another term that’s equivalent to police, which is cop, and it is usually used in America too.
- TOWNHOUSE: A townhouse is a house that is attached to another similar house. Townhouses are owned by individual tenants and have their own entrances. Well, it’s not exactly like perumahan (cluster) or rusun dalam bahasa Inggris as some townhouses are located by the main streets but townhouse can be a way to say perumahan in English.
- LEGIT: It’s actually short for legitimate, or legitimately. In Indonesian, you can say that as “bener banget.” Or at least, it’s equivalent to true.
- NOTES: If you’re asking “uang kertas dalam bahasa Inggris”, it’s actually money. But did you know there’s another word to say paper money? One of them is notes, which is commonly used in the UK, but not in the US as Americans say ‘bills’ instead.
- LOOT: Loot can pertain to stealing essential things from markets, in a massive way. This is how you say menjarah dalam bahasa Inggris.
- WASHROOM: Toilet dalam bahasa Inggris can also mean toilet, which is particularly common in British English. In Canada, however, people usually say washroom instead of toilet! We find this interesting as there is barely any country that uses washroom as Australians like to use ‘loo’ and Americans say ‘bathroom’.
QUIZ!
- Pay attention to the video above.
Then, fill in the blanks on what Diana had said on a supermarket mistakenly opened: “…they’re not just taking and _______ it, they’re actually taking it, like…” - Assume that you’re in Canada and you’re going to shop.
- You’re going to shop to, let’s say pertokoan dalam bahasa Indonesia. If in the UK you can say it as “high street,” how do you say it in Canada?
- You have to pay before you leave the shop. It’s crowded, so dalam bahasa Indonesia kalian bilang antri. You can say queue, but what’s the another word for queue when you’re in Canada?
