STEINBACH, MB
Local man Earl Peters reverted to Plautdietsch more than 3000 times during an hour-long conversation about beets with his friend Dan Friesen at the coffee shop this past week. The intermittent Plautdietsch usage set a new world record for bilingual conversation.
“It was pretty seamless,” said friend Mr. Friesen. “Every Mennonite switches back and forth between the two, but not every other word. Earl has quite the talent let me tell you.”
Mr. Peters interjected plekjbe, ommfotte, plekje, drakj, druglijch and dozens of other Plautdietsch words at will throughout the conversation. He sometimes even inserted an entire Low German sentence before going right back to English moments later.
“He’s a poet. I mean the man is amazing,” said Friesen. “Ten minutes into it, I figured, oba, I better start keeping track, at this pace he might break Jack Loeppky’s record at MJs back in ’87.”
Peters received a trophy for his accomplishment, which he was very dankboa for. His friend, Mr. Friesen, however, hopes he won’t try for a record again.
“I don’t have the heart to tell him,” said Mr. Friesen, “but I don’t understand a word of Low German.”
