〈 職人英語通〉 以其人之道，還治其人之身！ Give someone a taste of their own medicine!

圖／老唐

文／Dr.J.J. 圖／老唐

職場裡其實有很多白目的人，對這樣的人，即使說再多好聽的話、再有耐心，也往往沒有太大的功效，最好最簡單的方式，就是讓他們也能感同身受地體會到自己的所作所為，會對他人造成多大的困擾。

中文裡說「以其人之道還治其人之身」，而英文裡也有類似的成語，但卻是用「藥（medicine）的「味道（taste）來做比喻。〞give someone a taste of their own medicine〞意思是說，讓某人也嚐嚐自己加諸在別人身上的「苦果」──藥──是什麼滋味。

Jill：Let’s call this a day and leave the office now. See you tomorrow.

Jill：今天我們就工作到這兒囉，明天見。

Mia：But aren’t we supposed to finish the work Jennifer asked us to do by end of today?

Mia：但我們不是應該在今天下班前把Jennifer交待的事情做完嗎？

Jill：In theory, yes. She needs to consolidate our parts to make her final presentation to the Japanese clients on Wednesday.

Jill：理論上來說是啊。她要我們把自己負責的部分彙整進報告裡，禮拜三她才可以對日本客戶做簡報。

Mia：But if we leave just now with work unfinished, she’s going to have a heart attack. She’s expecting to see our report done tonight.

Mia：可是，要是我們沒弄完就走的話，她會心臟病發作的啦，她預期今晚可以看到我們的報告呢。

Jill：I’m aware of this. It’s just we all have work going on and she always gives us extra assignments in the last minute. If she could have let us know at least earlier, we could have planned our work load first.

Jill：我知道啊，可是我們大家也都有自己份內的工作要做，她總是在最後一分鐘才把工作丟給我們。要是她能早一點讓我們知道，大家就可以及早規劃自己的工作量了嘛。

Mia：So you’ll just tell her tomorrow that you couldn’t finish?

Mia：所以你打算明天告訴她說做不完嗎？

Jill：Yes, I’ll say I have another pre-decided project that needs to get done by tomorrow and I can only help with her project from tomorrow afternoon on.

Jill：對，我就跟她說，我已經有一個早就規劃好的案子是明天要完成的，我只能從明天下午再開始做她的報告了。

Mia：In this case, she’ll only have a few hours to work on it before her presentation. It’s gonna be too hard for her.

Mia：可是這樣的話，她明天就只剩幾個小時可以準備了。這樣對她有點殘忍耶。

Jill：I’m just giving her a taste of her own medicine so she’ll know how that feels herself.

Jill：我這叫做「以其人之道，還治其人之身」，這樣她以後就知道那種感覺了。

來源：自由時報

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++