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“They
said this MC speaks ‘very good’ Mandarin
but he does not even know how to say ‘model employee’
in Mandarin!”
“They told me
this MC is bilingual but he cannot read the Chinese
words written by our VIP from Taiwan!”
“Ours was supposed
to be a formal event attended by delegates from China
but the MC whom they said is ‘effectively bilingual’
punctuated his Mandarin with so many Singlish terms
that all our China delegates were turned off!”
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Do
all these sound familiar to you? Well, the entertainment
industry has been evolving at such an alarming pace that
gone are the days when an MC who speaks very fluent English
is always highly revered. With the enormous influx of mainland
Chinese nationals into Singapore, bilingual MCs are now
hot in demand. Unfortunately, they are so hard to find.
But it’s so easy to find MCs who can converse only
in a handful of Mandarin sentences but went on to claim
that they are effectively bilingual! As a result, you hear
the above complaints, right?
But
not this MC… SYLVESTER GOH!
Just how conversant is he in Mandarin? (He is TRILINGUAL,
if you include Cantonese)
When
he first burst into the industry in 1992, he amazed many
people with his “untouchable” linguistic skills,
doing on-the-spot translation without scripts from English
to Mandarin and vice-versa.
In
other words, give him a script in English; he can translate
it into Mandarin on the spot, right on stage!
Whisper
any instructions into his ears in English while he is doing
a show, he can rattle out your instructions in Mandarin
on stage straightaway!
Let
him watch other MCs conduct games in English, he can immediately
play the same games using Mandarin!
Most
of all, put him next to the VIP on stage and whatever the
VIP said in English, he will translate them into Mandarin
(and vice-versa) on the spot!
This
is why he is known as a “rare species”. Whether
it’s a wacky English-speaking dinner & dance or
a Chinese dialect-speaking festival celebration, you can
count on him.
Handling audiences of any nationalities, Canadians, Americans,
Britons, Australians, English-speaking Mexicans, South Americans,
Europeans or Southeast Asians like Indonesians, Malaysians,
Myanmarese or Filipinos, or Chinese-speaking nationals like
the mainland Chinese, Taiwanese or Hongkongers, well, just
leave them all to him!
Audiences
of any social status, Corporate Executives, Overseas Delegates,
Office Administrators, Production Workers, Drivers, Cleaners,
Foreign Workers etc… no problem for him!
Difficult
audiences which many MCs dare not face, like dialect spouting
elderly, Down syndrome children, autistic children, well,
he has handled them as well!
One
Gentle Reminder: If you judge him by his age, Then your
judgment is garbage!
Not impressed by his image? Wait till you see him on stage!
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