"Halo"!

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Posted: Mon Aug 26, 2019 12:08 am

Lads are lazy. We all know this. There are also Lads that seem to put a little effort into their scripts.

Meet "Amália."

Quote:

Halo,
Pardon me again my English very poor Smile

. I wait you replying me for me email I sending you 3 days now. Now I checking my email and still you not reply and I thinking maybe you see or maybe you not see. Can write me to say me if you receiving my email or not and also if you reading my proposition or not. Maybe you not understanding it because my English very poor. If not understanding, ok, I finding some person better from me in English to help writing to you, ok? Ok can you replying me very quickly and to letting I know what you deciding.
Thank you
Amália

Cammy's reply was slightly shorter.

Quote:

I didn't get any email from you. I'm sure about that.

Amalia wrote back promptly:

Quote:

Halo Camille,
thank you for message. I writing you before maybe 4 days now to talking about the deal and investment thing. Please can you checking carefully your email. If not receiving i sending again that email, ok?

Okay...

Quote:

I checked, and I didn't hear from you about your deal and investment thing. Trust me on this.

Here comes the pitch:

Quote:

Halo Camille, I am confusing now why you not see my letter. Ok. I try to writing again now.
I working the job account in Tribunal de Cuentas. This is Tribunal de auditors in my country. Aha, before I forgetting, I have originality Salamanca Espana but I living in Madrid.
In January, one company have problem because not paying tax proper. Me and one other auditor send to checking account for this company for investigation. So, when checking we see big problem because you see, here in Espana have very big tax and many people don’t like pay. So they make false.
When we checking found big discrepant. When we want to making reporting this company many plead to us to we don’t making our reporting against for them. I don’t know how to say in English but here we say Validación. They want we Validación for their report to say every is ok.
So, after we negotiating we agree, but for this, we make deal for they pay to us. For safeness, I don’t like to say now in this email how much. But they accepting to pay because they scared. They make to many deal in back and have many discrepant. They very scared because of this.
Problem now is government always watching us because our job natural. They checking our account in the bank and also checking other people relation to me, like sister and cousin. Also my community very small and every people talk too much. If in sudden you have big money or example maybe you buy car, hmmmmm, everybody calling everybody to say you buy car. For this I cannot receive this money here because I don’t have how to keep here.
I will going off Espana after my contract is finish in 2021, maybe. But now in this moment I cannot do any thing, you see. This why I writing you. Can you receive money for me to save for me?
Also, I want to buying apartments in other big cities and making renting for when I retire. For me this is very lucrativo business. You keep money and you finding good house in good places and prices. Any times you finding good ones you buy for me. I speaking to one abogado I trusting him because this abogado representing me before when I divorcing with my ex. This abogado making documentation for agreement for us for safeness. I know still very important to have honest in this business but also very important to making everything very clear in paper for agreement.
Also, I giving you take 15% in now. Plus I paying you 15% agencia comisión every time you buying apartments for me. Agencya comisión is maybe 5% - 10% every place in world. But I giving you 15% plus 15% I give now. Everything make clearly in agreement.
I hope you understanding what I proposing you? Sorry for me English very poor but if not understand I try explain again. I waiting you reply to me and thank you. I know my English is disaster, sorry hahahahah

I'd guessed that the Lad was aiming for a Spanish vibe. But... "Halo"? Not "Hola"? Rolling Eyes

Posted: Mon Aug 26, 2019 12:31 am

I'm reserving judgement on this. Yes, the English is poor, but it's too damned grammatically correct (to a certain point). Yes, the verb tenses and pronouns are off, but that almost looks intentional, and they're almost entirely in the correct order. Even the sentence structure is too good (commas in the correct places, no 'run on', etc.)
As someone who has been married to a native Spanish speaker for 30 years, who only knew about 12 English words when we first met, I can assure you that no Spanish speaker with 'poor English' would structure their sentences that well.
It looks like something I'd write if I was trying to write in 'poor English'.

Are you sure you're not being baited? Very Happy

Edited to change 'had been married' to 'has been married' Embarassed

Posted: Mon Aug 26, 2019 12:40 am

I have to agree with crashhoot here, this sounds a bit suspicious and not lad-like. I’m not quite sure who knows the words for things like divorce but not lawyer (abogado), and the spelling in the Spanish is inconsistent; besides, given the otherwise strong English, who wouldn’t make the link between “validation” and “validación”? Things like “lucrativo” sound like what I would write if I were attempting to play a Spanish character, and the lack of a tilde on España would be strange if coming from someone who regularly used a Spanish keyboard. I don’t think whoever this is speaks Spanish.

This is most likely either a bizarrely smart lad that’s too committed to his character or a baiter who missed the memo. It couldn’t hurt to keep baiting and see what happens.

Posted: Mon Aug 26, 2019 1:28 am

I just showed this thread to my wife, and she agrees 100%. Laughing

Yastreb wrote:

But... "Halo"? Not "Hola"?

Although the Spanish word for 'hello' is 'hola', many Spanish speakers (at least all the ones my wife knows) answer the telephone 'halo', pronounced 'ah low'. In thirty years, I've never figured out why!

Posted: Mon Aug 26, 2019 3:25 am

Dare we mention... it could be a b.a.d.g.e.r at large?

Elite Baiter Joined: 30 Apr 2017 Posts: 1055

crashhoot wrote:

It looks like something I'd write if I was trying to write in 'poor English'.

Funyily enough I was haveing those very same thorts befor I reeched crashhoot's post but then again I don't need too try it just seams too cume naturaly too me. Laughing

No spelcheker was usd in the righting of this post.

Posted: Mon Aug 26, 2019 6:02 am

I get the impression of a Slav pretending to be Spanish, rather than a real Spaniard. A Czech would have the acute accent, but not the tilde. So would a Hungarian (they're not Slavs, but they are neighbors of the Czechs, and they share phonemic vowel length, written as á, but not phonemic stress, which is normally on the first syllable). A Russian would drop "am, is, are".

Quote:

Me and one other auditor send to checking account

Many native English speakers use "me" like this although it's wrong, and a French speaker would too, but a Spanish speaker would not, unless someone else sent me and the auditor to the checking account. I don't know about Czech, but the Russian construction for "I and the auditor" is "We with auditor".

crashhoot wrote:

answer the telephone 'halo'

Probably from French «allô», which is from English "hello".

Posted: Mon Aug 26, 2019 6:33 am

I think its lad script. The Spanish prisoner letter was the very first scam I ever saw. My father showed it to me when I was 8 years old and I asked him why anyone would take the time to hand type a letter, correct the typos by hand and then pay the international postage. He explained that the scam works on some people, not all but enough to make it worthwhile to them. I thought back to what he told me when I received my first email scam to my CompuServe box around 1989. It was supposedly from Spain.

Earlier this year I posted a photo of a scam letter sent by snail mail from England. Last month I received another snail mail scam from Madrid.

The scammers have found by experience that pretending to be from England, Spain, and recently for me Florida will help sell the scam. Baiters know that someone saying that they are a service member is a red flag but what about John Q. Public? I asked my Orlando lad three weeks ago how the weather was that day and he said it was really nice. I knew it was 94 degrees with the humidity close behind. Last night I asked a service member if he carried a gun. He said he did. I asked him what kind and he said it was a handgun. I asked him what kind because guns and people that carry them turned me on and he said it was an automatic. I asked him if he had it on him and he said he did. I told him "Oh, I am getting excited. What kind of handgun? Tell me what it says on it." He said it was an M4, a machine gun. "Who made it? Please don't spare the details, big powerful man you are." He said CRC three times.

For a few years we were getting a lot of scammers that were pretending to be Chinese. While Hung Lo will still send his ID on occasion, it has become rare. The lads move on and the guys that were faking the Chinese accents will be faking Spanish ones. I am sure that many scammers have built up their empires by pretending to be Spanish and wannabees are either buying their script or are willing to hand off a victim to the boss.

Expect to see a change in the writing over the course of the next few emails.

Posted: Mon Aug 26, 2019 1:09 pm

My experience with Spanish speakers involves those from the Western Hemisphere (Mexico, Cuba, Puerto Rico, Chicago, Miami, etc.)

Divorcio is a word that is used here.

As I read the lad, I am reminded of my own Mexican divorcee, Marisol and the way I, as a non-native Spanish speaker write her. This especially comes into play with the lack of accents and tildes as I type on a standard English keyboard.

I think vonpaso is onto something here and he can give more linguistic clarification than I:

Quote:

I get the impression of a Slav pretending to be Spanish

Look at this sentence:

Quote:

Maybe you not understanding it because my English very poor. If not understanding, ok,

Native Spanish speakers would use "No" instead of "not." Why type out the extra letter? The constant use of verbs ending in -ing is also a huge red flag to the origin, imo.

Master of Master Baiters Joined: 05 Jan 2017 Posts: 790

Quote:

Lads are lazy. We all know this. There are also Lads that seem to put a little effort into their scripts.

Too many full stops in my expert opinion - Yastreb is pure dodgy

Posted: Mon Aug 26, 2019 7:37 pm

My English and Spanish are both Leftpondian. The differences between Leftpondian and Rightpondian Spanish are:
*accent (<z> is /θ/ in Spain, /s/ here, except that in southern Spain they pronounce <z> and <s> alike as we do here)
*vocabulary (e.g. computadora vs. ordenador)
*second-person pronouns ("vosotros" is used only in hymns and the Bible over here; in Spain it's the normal plural of "tú").
There are similar differences among Leftpondian Spanish dialects (some pronounce <-n> as [ŋ], there are several words for "pig" or "turkey", and in some areas "vos" can be used with a singular referent). None of these differences are big enough to affect the plausibility of that email being written by a Spanish speaker. The writer is not Spanish or Hispanic from either side of the Pond.

English and Spanish both have progressive tenses; they all have a form of "be/estar" as auxiliary. Spanish is pro-drop, so "Am speaking" is a plausible attempt at English by a Spanish speaker, but "I speaking" is not.

I'm not sure of the writer's exact native language, but it seems Eastern European to me.

Posted: Mon Aug 26, 2019 7:45 pm

See.

Posted: Tue Aug 27, 2019 1:06 am

Quote:

Too many full stops in my expert opinion - Yastreb is pure dodgy

I see what you did there.

Meanwhile, I decided that Cammy would cut to the chase.

Quote:

I think I understand you. If I'm right, you want me to help you hide the money you made from taking bribes to hide tax evasion.

Amalia was indignant:

Quote:

No I not hiding for tax. Not me. Another company hiding for tas and I helping to saving them from going prosecutor. So they paying me for this but I cant keep this money myself because I working in very sensitive department in government where they checking everything we do and checking our bank account to see what we doing. I cannot even buy cloth above my salary because they asking where you get the money. You understand? So I wanting you receive the money this company paying to me to keep silence and for not reporting them to the government. You understand?

So Amalia is not hiding tax evasion; she's taking bribes to keep silent about the company's tax evasion and not reporting them to the government.

Gotcha.

Elite Baiter Joined: 28 Mar 2015 Posts: 1916

I might need to be corrected, but this lad is Nigerian, or at least West African, imo - note the use of the word 'cloth' for 'clothes'.
Even educated Nigerians and Ghanaians I have met tend to use the word this way.

Posted: Wed Sep 04, 2019 8:36 am

Progress report; it's still going.

Cammy replied to Amalia with her understanding of the situation.

Quote:

So... you're not evading tax, but you took a bribe to help someone else to evade tax... which is what I said in the first place. You understand?

Amalia finally conceded Cammy's point:

Quote:

Ok. Maybe. But i cannot paying tax because I cannot declaring I receive money. So yes, i hiding the money and hiding the tax. I happy to paying the tax but I cannot say I receive this money because is coming from bribing. Maybe we saying the same thing. Sorry my English Smile

It's time to move on.

Quote:

Now you've confused me (kidding)! So after all the palaver, turns out I was right all along. Am I good or what?
There's one thing that you've never mentioned in all this - all this talk about "big money" and you didn't say how much. Let's clear that up first.

Amalia's overplaying her bad English:

Quote:

Halo Camille, sorry my English very poor. I try to reading and writing by myself. I now to answer, the money is 800.000,00 EUR but I agree to giving lawyer 5 percentage for him helping to making all documents. You understanding? So now I sending you 760.000,00 EUR. You understanding?

So I thought I'd have some fun and toss in some very mangled slang.

Quote:

OK, 760,000 Euros - that's about $1,250,000. Not meaning to burst your parade, but with house prices the way they are, I could get you just one decent house. You understand? "Any times you finding good ones you buy for me" - sorry, sister, those wheels won't fly. You understand?

This came as no surprise:

Quote:

Sorry but I not understanding.

Quote:

By Freyja's tears, we're going nowhere fast! You can't understand me, and I can't dumb down that well. What's next?

More to come?

Posted: Thu Sep 05, 2019 5:12 am

Amalia has the answer:

Quote:

Maybe you talking to my lawyer. He speaking English good, ok?

Cammy's OK with that.

Quote:

Sure, why not.

Posted: Thu Sep 05, 2019 1:08 pm

You have to love a lawyer speaking English good, ok.

Posted: Wed Sep 11, 2019 9:24 pm

Things have gone quiet. On 6 September, Amalia wrote:

Quote:

Ok. you having whatsapp? Can you give your number. I asking him calling you.

Cammy had to decline.

Quote:

I don't have Whatsapp - just tell whatever his name is to write to me.

Since then, nothing from Amalia and no sign of the lawyer speaking English good.