There's a movie, from the early 1960s or something, in which Jackie Gleason plays a deaf-and-dumb man, and befriends the son of a woman of easy virtue.
I've never seen the movie myself, and don't know it's name.
Anyway, I've been told I "act" like that with people new to me. And then after I get a few "bearings" from the body language (after all, each individual has his own body language, and so it requires that one be mega-multi-linguistic), it's much easier.
In the beginning, I had a 3x5 card with certain "key" words in Ukrainian/Russian-English, as did four other people; the same card.
But due to quickness of learning (both sides), those became superfluous.
As I "taught"--so-called--spoken English, apparently others tended to imitate me.
One time I met a Canadian who spoke with the interpreter, and complimented him on his good English. Upon learning that I had "taught" him, she turned to me, asking, "Oh, is that the Nebraska accent?"
No, I told her; that was the franksolich accent; people in Nebraska are generally known to have no accent.
I remember watching that movie on TV as a child. It was "Gigot".
Gleason's character was much like "The Poor Soul ", the character he played on The Jackie Gleason Show.
It looks like it's no longer available. He was good at saying 1000 words while saying nothing.
Filmed in 1962, Gigot.
Gleason wrote the original story and music for this film.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2rkGRl-cq2I