Ho boy. Where do I start...

Wednesday, October 04, 2006

Spanglish

I don't speak Spanish. In addition, I don't speak broken English with a Spanish accent. This can cause problems. For example, on my recent trip to Miami, when we asked housekeeping for a rollaway "sleeper", we got an extra pair of slippers.

Earlier this week, I had to bring my car in for some routine maintenance. I live on a Metro station, so I just dropped off my car and took advantage of the dealership's shuttle service. My driver must not have had a valid license because he seemed to take every out-of-the-way, back road to get me to the station. The trip home took three times as long as it should have. To pass the time, the driver engaged me in conversation...

Driver: You have keys?
Mel: Yes. I grabbed the keys I need.
Driver: How many keys you have?
Mel: Uhhhhhhh. I dunno. Four?
Driver: Four keys? Wow. In school?
Mel: No. I graduated a while ago.
Driver: No. Not you. Your keys.
Mel: What?
Driver: Your keys in school?
Mel: Oh, KIDS! I don't have any kids.
Driver: What?
Mel: No keys.
Driver: Oh.
Do they make Rosetta Stone Software for this?

4 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

You've gotta learn the language, Mel!

10:20 PM

 
Blogger Catherine said...

ahh mel - had one of these ın ıstanbul already.
strange turkısh man- what do you do?
me- İ work in educatıon
STM- kids?
me- yes, kids
STM- big and small?
me- small
STM- how many?
me- 35 to 40
STM- you have 30 kids!

12:14 PM

 
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Here you go Mel. Send an email to them to see if they can add Spanglish to their growing list of languages.

http://www.rosettastone.com/en/individuals/customer-service

2:46 PM

 
Anonymous Anonymous said...

hah. sleeper= slippers.

12:49 PM

 

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