There is one English speaking person on staff at my restaurant that is not a manager in the kitchen. One. His name is Shaggy (obviously a nickname) and no better nickname has ever been applied. If he asked me about Scooby Snacks, it wouldn't even phase me. Not even a little.
I took 5 years of Spanish a very long time ago. I can barely speak it, but can read and understand it fairly well. As long as it falls into the generic public school Spanish that I took. When the amigos asked me if I spoke Spanish, I said no. Because, honestly, I didn't want to look stupid. Which is STUPID. But, spur of the moment decision...it's already going to be hard for me and I didn't want to add in fucking up their native language.
Ugh. Even with my limited knowledge, the language barrier is terrible. And I just feel like everyone is annoyed with me all of the time. I don't know if that is true. I just feel like they all think I am this giant idiot who can't speak Spanish and can't keep up with them.
The latter part is only true because every time I ask a question or ask where something is, I just get a blank stare and then a made up answer that makes no sense so I just figure it out on my own.
I am so ready to be done with training. The person who was training me today literally could not even converse with me. I asked him how long he worked with the company and he said "Si, si. Es bien." Meaning, "yes, yes. It's good." Yeah...so....that part sucks. And, honestly, when left alone with the various Spanish Pandora stations, I want to impale myself on something very, very sharp.
Do you know what is worse than talk radio? Talk radio in a language you don't speak. FOR 12 HOURS STRAIGHT. I so far have understood one story and all I know is that it was about Jennifer Lopez.
Tomorrow I actually start training on the line and will have someone who speaks English there the entire time. IT WILL BE AMAZING.
A part of me feels bad that I am so miserable because it's not their fault. A part of me wants to scream "YOU ARE IN AMERICA, LEARN FUCKING ENGLISH," but I am not that person. Maybe I am a little bit that person because I just typed that. But deep down, not really.
So, if anyone has access to Rosetta Stone and wants to share, I will not turn you down.
Being the minority kind of sucks. Is it weird for a very white girl to say that? It totally is.
I have dealt with sexism plenty, I can put some dudes in their place in a second. I just have to learn how to do that in Spanish. And fast. Or I am going to have exactly zero people that respect me there and that is just not ok with me.
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1 comment:
Ugh, it's SO hard to feel like the outsider who can't quite keep up. When I lived in France I was pretty fluent by the end, but the first few months were SO hard. Good luck picking back up with your Spanish skills!
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