off the wall question

KristinaB

KristinaB

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As most of you know - I am just learning ASL and I have picked up quite a bit and I start a class tomorrow.

Last night at dinner in Perkins, I signed what I wanted for dinner and my son translated (he wanted to prove he could figure it out). The waitress is enjoying learning what little she can from me.

I had no problem with water with 2 lemons and I got stuck on Chef salad, so I just fingerspelled chef, then did the sign for salad.

Is there a sign for chef salad or did I do it correctly?
 
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There is no sign for "chef" salad and you did right by spelling "chef" then signing salad. However, there is a sign for a person who cooks professionally and in charge of everyone else in the kitchen, "chef". You would sign "supreme cooker". Makes sense?
 
DoDaDew said:
There is no sign for "chef" salad and you did right by spelling "chef" then signing salad. However, there is a sign for a person who cooks professionally and in charge of everyone else in the kitchen, "chef". You would sign "supreme cooker". Makes sense?
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I guess??? :hmm:

I'll stick with the way I did it. Thanks for the help.
 
yea fingerspell chef or you can do "cook person" sign. I'd fingerspell it.
 
"Cook person" is confusing. I think you are on the right track with spelling chef and signing salad.
 
I usually just write it down at this point and hand it to the waitress. Fewer mistakes.

The other day, one turned it over, drew a smiley, and wrote "thanks."
 
Yes, Kristina, you signed chef's salad correctly.
 
I do the same thing Botts

Saves me the hassle and fustration in dealing with Waitresses.

:D

I'm well known in town, they see me come in and waitresses are bringing the paper and pen!

lol
 
KristinaB said:
As most of you know - I am just learning ASL and I have picked up quite a bit and I start a class tomorrow.

Last night at dinner in Perkins, I signed what I wanted for dinner and my son translated (he wanted to prove he could figure it out). The waitress is enjoying learning what little she can from me.

I had no problem with water with 2 lemons and I got stuck on Chef salad, so I just fingerspelled chef, then did the sign for salad.

Is there a sign for chef salad or did I do it correctly?
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I think you did it right...when in doubt fingerspell.....
 
I like to gesture my order to them and watch them panic :giggle: Normally I can convince them to calm down enough to just watch and see that they CAN understand.
 
Glenn said:
"Cook person" is confusing. I think you are on the right track with spelling chef and signing salad.
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Agree because ASL is a conceptual language. If you had used the sign for "cook person" , it would translate to referring to a person and then salad making the concept confusing so fingerspelling the kind of salad is always conceptually accurate.
 
I wonder if using the original chef's name for chef salad would be better? Victor Seydoux was the chef who created chef salad. And since then, people request his salad and eventually, people began to called it Chef's salad which is they meant Chef Victor's salad
 
Hey Kristina... how'd your class go? Mine was fantastic! I had so much fun!!
And I would've done just what you did... fingerspell "chef" then sign "salad".
:)
 
Hutt5asl said:
Hey Kristina... how'd your class go? Mine was fantastic! I had so much fun!!
And I would've done just what you did... fingerspell "chef" then sign "salad".
:)
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Class went great!! Only 17 out of the expected group showed up. We went over deaf history (Laurent Clerc and Thomas Gallaudet), pronouns, and 43 signs and have to have it all memorized before next Wednesday. There will be a test at the beginning of class.

I am the only deaf, no hoh people, 1 man who will have to go another year without speech due to throat cancer surgery and the rest were teacher for the local public school system or Head Start. the head start ladies had to drive a long way. 3 hours on a good travel day, but with traffic, it takes an extra 1-2 hours.

At one point during class, I started feeling the floor vibrate and the desk vibrate. As I was looking around trying to figured it out, the whole class started to laugh at me. The instructor heard and admonished them and explained that it was rude of them to laugh, then he let me know that it was just a train and reminded me that the tracks are right behind the building. Turned out to be 2 side by side trains, 1 going north and the other going south.
 
In this situation, "Chef" is being used as a modifier, or name for a particular kind of salad. Therefor, it's not being used conceptually, so spelling it is the correct form. Probably even more accurate would be to sign SALAD, and then spell the type of salad, such as "chef" or "caesar".

There is another sign for chef, which uses the C-hands like classifiers to make the shape of the chef's hat on the signer's head. A sous chef would be CHEF-ASSISTANT, and an executive chef would be CHEF-BOSS or CHEF-SUPREME. The COOK-AGENT sign would apply more to the line cook. Of course, for people outside of the culinary profession, the generic COOK-AGENT would serve most purposes.

In real life, most of my deaf friends point to the items on the menu that they desire.
 
Reba said:
In real life, most of my deaf friends point to the items on the menu that they desire.
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Yes, that is what I think most of us do. Sometimes there is a special request that we can't point to explain and I type it into my blackberry and show them. Sometimes I gesture too - most of the time I gesture my drink if there isn't a list.
 
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