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When he was a student in linguistics and English at the University of California, Berkeley, David Peterson worked on a secret language for two months. It was called “Megdevi”. This was an amalgam of both his own name and Megan, his girlfriend at the time. Once satisfied with his new words and grammar rules, he presented it to her. It was his grand romantic gesture: a private language they could use to communicate only with each other. 戴维•彼得森(David Peterson)在美国加州大学伯克利分校(University of California, Berkeley)学习语言学和英文时，花两个月时间发明了一种秘密语言，给它取名为“梅戴语”(Megdevi)——这是大卫和他当时的女友梅甘(Megan)名字的结合体。待新词和语法规则令他满意后，他将成果展示给女友。这是他送出的一份非常浪漫的爱情大礼：一种只在他俩之间使用的私密语言。 “We didn’t use it”, the 33-year-old admits today, 15 years later. While Megan appreciated the effort, she did not want to learn the language. “It was far too much work.” Now married to someone else, he is more agitated about the technical shortcomings of Megdevi, describing it as “an abomination”. He laments: “It tried to be a bunch of different things at once and ended up being nothing.” 不过15年后，33岁的彼得森承认：“我们没用过它。”梅甘虽然赞赏了他的努力，但并不想学习这门语言。“太费力了。”如今，已娶别人为妻的彼得森对“梅戴语”的技术缺陷更为心烦，称之“令人讨厌”。他叹道：“它想一次实现许多个目标，结果落得一无是处。” | 
