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Transcription: [00:00:04]
{SPEAKER name="Barbara Kannupell/John Ennis (interpreter)"}
Israel, Israeli. The uh, where I worked was at the World's Fair in New York in '65, I was working at a restaurant, as a busboy, picking up all the tables and so forth, and I noticed there was a deaf couple talking.
[00:00:24]
But I couldn't understand them at all.
[00:00:27]
I was trying to figure out what they were saying, so I decided to go there and tell them I'm deaf.
[00:00:31]
And we knew that each of us were deaf but trying to get the message across-- I found that they were from England.
[00:00:40]
And they used a lot of this uh, I'm not-- I think it's a, e, i, o, u's on the different fingers and then a two handed alphabet.
[00:00:50]
And my God. I-I could not follow them. What they were saying- they were saying something.
[00:00:56]
Another time I met, uh, a man from Israel.
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And he did not know English. But through gestures it was almost as if, uh, we could talk without any problems.
[00:01:10]
So it really varies in the way that you can communicate with different people.
[00:01:15]


{SPEAKER name="Don Pettingill"}
Thanks for asking me if sign language is international. I would like to show you one of my own inventions in sign language.
[00:01:24]
Yes, no. Yes, no. Sign language in itself is pretty much common sense.
[00:01:35]
Pretty much- but English, things like that. I remember going to Israel, and our language was completely different. But within one day we were communicating beautifully because of that.
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I would like to say to- and then - I didn't think of it would work, would.
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So I would ask somebody who spoke English- "what's the sign for that?" and they would show me. So I would just go right ahead and really it's rather easy to establish communication.
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We had what we called international sign language, and we do have some different signs-
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One of the most beautiful signs I have ever seen was ... in America was that - not possible, not possible, not possible.
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You're being insane, impossible, impossible, I think that's beautiful. See things like that we learn from them too!
[00:02:38]


Transcription Notes:
Don Pettingill is the 2nd speaker - recognize voice from other recordings.