What is the Situation?

Different cultures have similarities alongside their deep differences. When two people meet, after greeting, they normally ask what the news is. This is common in the old country. Here though they might not even say Hi and they go “What’s up?” It’s fine. People are different. I somehow have changed it to a punch line now which goes: What’s the situation? The people whom already are asked this question know what to answer. The ones who are asked for the first time usually come back with the question of their own: What situation? And I reply: The general situation. Some start on the actual situation and some, usually the ones who are born here or have been living here since their childhood, give a short version answer. Either one is fine by me because I know what to expect next time I ask the same.

A few days ago I bumped to this guy and after a few words was exchanged he said: The situation is very bad (!) one of my friends got chopped off last week too. It means it will be soon going to be expected as a phrase in the society. How long will it take to have it as a normal greeting line? I would say a very long time particularly because it Is not used when the economy is its normal, flowing situation. Rather than that speakers of English as a native language do not accept a phrase similar to this as a correct one grammatically. They consider that a terms coming out of a poor immigrant who is trying to learn the language and still is struggling! They simply ignore that.

Nevertheless the term situation is frequently used in military. Expressions such as “What is your situation in there?” have been heard. This refers to the number of wounded and KIA as well as the way the position is in regards to the enemies. So this is an accepted and correct term but it is not used in daily conversation. So are many other terms and expressions. Every business has its own specific terms and language which is not used in other fields. For example a Sizer is a machine which turns small objects (mainly rocks) to fine particles. The word Sizer in any other filed means nothing. MS Word considers is a misspelling when it is typed. Examples are plenty. ‘nough said.