missed the bus - thank goodness!
So I have a Cuban neurologist crashing at my house for a few nights. This morning, I decided I wanted to make cafecito (Cuban coffee) for him, so I got the espresso maker going. At 8:05, Graham decided he couldn't wait around any more, so he started out to the bus stop...only to find that the school bus was just leaving! Panic time! Suddenly I had to get him to school and at the same time, the coffee was just starting to boil!
Luckily, Kathy (my stepmother and translator for Dr. Tony) was ready to take Graham to school, so she got him into her rental car and took off. I went back to the kitchen full of anxiety and kicking myself for making the dumb coffee be such a big dumb deal that my kid missed the school bus and now I was going to miss walking with my neighbors, too. Also, here I was in the house alone with Dr. Tony, whose English is about as good as my Spanish - how on Earth were we going to communicate anything? And what if he didn't like the coffee after all? Then all that effort and chaos would be for nothing.
Well, I made the coffee (and was very pleased with myself that I was able to create the espumita, which the Web site said was desirable but tricky to make) and went upstairs to tell the doctor that it was ready. He didn't come down for a long while, and I wondered whether he was feeling as shy as I was.
Finally, he came down, looking quite dapper as always. He tried the coffee and pronounced it "very nice." That made me happy. I had tried it and thought it was very tasty - like hot liquid coffee candy - so I was prepared to be at least partly happy with the experiment anyway. Now I was completely happy with it.
Over the coffee, I explained in my best Spanglish what had happened with Graham and where Kathy was. We then discussed the weather and various other sundries. The more we talked, the more comfortable we felt with each other despite the communication limitations. At one point, Dr. Tony wanted to say something about a city - he knew the word "city" but not the other word, and I didn't understand the Spanish word he was saying. So he grabbed the Spanish-English dictionary I had gotten out and looked up the word - "esmerelda," which means "emerald." The Emerald City! Somehow, it was very cool that he picked up on Seattle's nickname. So then we talked about green trees for a little while.
Then Kathy came back, and the three of us had a very good conversation about communicating with people who don't speak your language. It turns out that Dr. Tony studied English for five years when he was in school (almost exactly like me - I studied Spanish for four years in junior high and high school) but that since he had nobody to practice with, he lost a lot of it (just like me). I think we were both encouraged to know that about one another and that neither of us needed to worry (although we did) about being perceived poorly because of our limited language skills. Altogether, it was a very amicable discussion, and I felt really comfortable with Dr. Tony for the first time.
A big part of the language barrier for me has been the Cuban way of pronouncing words. For example, when he said "esmerelda," it sounded like "eh-merel." Similarly, he once asked Kathy whether she understood something by saying "entien?" instead of "entiendes?" It's been a double challenge for me in that way. Even Kathy says she doesn't understand about a third of what Dr. Tony is saying.
But part of my goal in welcoming Dr. Tony into my house was to have the experience of meeting with a person from a completely different culture, with a different language and different way of seeing the world, and to find out some about where our commonalities lie. Although the inroads are small because of the language barrier, I do think I've accomplished that goal.
Hooray for missing the bus!
Luckily, Kathy (my stepmother and translator for Dr. Tony) was ready to take Graham to school, so she got him into her rental car and took off. I went back to the kitchen full of anxiety and kicking myself for making the dumb coffee be such a big dumb deal that my kid missed the school bus and now I was going to miss walking with my neighbors, too. Also, here I was in the house alone with Dr. Tony, whose English is about as good as my Spanish - how on Earth were we going to communicate anything? And what if he didn't like the coffee after all? Then all that effort and chaos would be for nothing.
Well, I made the coffee (and was very pleased with myself that I was able to create the espumita, which the Web site said was desirable but tricky to make) and went upstairs to tell the doctor that it was ready. He didn't come down for a long while, and I wondered whether he was feeling as shy as I was.
Finally, he came down, looking quite dapper as always. He tried the coffee and pronounced it "very nice." That made me happy. I had tried it and thought it was very tasty - like hot liquid coffee candy - so I was prepared to be at least partly happy with the experiment anyway. Now I was completely happy with it.
Over the coffee, I explained in my best Spanglish what had happened with Graham and where Kathy was. We then discussed the weather and various other sundries. The more we talked, the more comfortable we felt with each other despite the communication limitations. At one point, Dr. Tony wanted to say something about a city - he knew the word "city" but not the other word, and I didn't understand the Spanish word he was saying. So he grabbed the Spanish-English dictionary I had gotten out and looked up the word - "esmerelda," which means "emerald." The Emerald City! Somehow, it was very cool that he picked up on Seattle's nickname. So then we talked about green trees for a little while.
Then Kathy came back, and the three of us had a very good conversation about communicating with people who don't speak your language. It turns out that Dr. Tony studied English for five years when he was in school (almost exactly like me - I studied Spanish for four years in junior high and high school) but that since he had nobody to practice with, he lost a lot of it (just like me). I think we were both encouraged to know that about one another and that neither of us needed to worry (although we did) about being perceived poorly because of our limited language skills. Altogether, it was a very amicable discussion, and I felt really comfortable with Dr. Tony for the first time.
A big part of the language barrier for me has been the Cuban way of pronouncing words. For example, when he said "esmerelda," it sounded like "eh-merel." Similarly, he once asked Kathy whether she understood something by saying "entien?" instead of "entiendes?" It's been a double challenge for me in that way. Even Kathy says she doesn't understand about a third of what Dr. Tony is saying.
But part of my goal in welcoming Dr. Tony into my house was to have the experience of meeting with a person from a completely different culture, with a different language and different way of seeing the world, and to find out some about where our commonalities lie. Although the inroads are small because of the language barrier, I do think I've accomplished that goal.
Hooray for missing the bus!