I Laugh to Keep from Crying

Living in another culture has been…funny? frustrating? lonely? enriching? All of the above?

Sometimes I can start feeling sorry for myself about how hard it is to order a taco or how I don’t feel safe to venture out by myself, thus I am stuck indoors all day, etc. But then I remember how incredible this journey is, how lucky (if you need to insert “blessed” here to sleep better tonight, please do. I always wondered at what age I would start incorporating words like “blessed” into my vocabulary with ease. So far, it’s not been in the first 30 years of my life. I’ll keep you posted.) I am to get to experience another culture, and how humbling it is to believe my life is not my own.

I wish I had a camera following us around some days so that we can watch the footage later and be amused by our sad little Spanish skills, our amazing charade skills, and our ability to survive each day.  Sometimes I just have to laugh to keep from crying. But sometimes I do both at the same time and that scares the children. If this blog were a camera, here is the footage:

*I found out today that all this time I’ve been asking people if they love me rather than asking if they want me to do something for them, which was my intended question. Oops. It explains a lot of the weird responses I’ve gotten.

*Alan was trying to order hamburgers the other day, over the phone, and even warned them that his Spanish was not great. Not even halfway through the order, they hung up on him because he kept asking them to repeat the question because he didn’t understand. We really wanted burgers, so we took our order down to the guard at our apartment complex and asked if he could do it for us. You hit a low point when you can’t successfully order a hamburger.

*Speaking of the guard, Alan and he like to teach each other vocabulary in their respective languages. He teaches Alan Spanish words and Alan teaches him English words. Alan was trying to teach him to say ‘peanuts’ but did not emphasize how important the ‘t’ is. So our guard was saying, loudly, “pee-nus. Pee-nus? Pee-nus!!!” I wonder how many times our mispronunciations result in us talking about inappropriate things.

*The girls often have projects due for school that seem pretty advanced. This last project they had to give a presentation on a certain subject, accompanied by a visual aid such as power point, a diorama, etc. This is not my strength, so when we created two play-dough sharks with a few fish and even some seaweed and glued them onto a piece of cardboard (probably 6in. x 8in.) covered in blue tissue paper I found crumpled up in an old gift bag, I felt really proud. Overly proud. We even gave the Great White Shark rice teeth so they looked sharp. At the end of the week (the project was due Monday), the teacher sent the projects home with all the students’ parents. As I stood in the schoolyard with my little six-inch diorama (and I say mine because I basically made the whole thing) parents were streaming by me with these big, ornate projects. One included a whale, leaping out of the airbrushed ocean surrounded by dozens of fish that were NOT created with play-dough. And it was probably 2ft. x 2ft. I just started laughing because if this is what happens in preschool, then we are in TROUBLE. The worst part is, I was thinking I could just chalk it up as a fail and put the little sharks in a drawer somewhere, but no. They want to display all the children’s projects next month, so we need to bring them back. After the diorama spent a week in a classroom with 3 year olds, the poor shark looks like it’s from West Virginia, with only 4 teeth.

*Oh, did I tell you about that time I punched a nanny in the mouth? THAT was embarrassing. I was opening up my arms real wide for a hug from Clementine after school, but what I didn’t realize was that a really short lady was standing behind me and her mouth was exactly the same height as my flailing arms and BAM! I whacked her in the face. We had only been here a few weeks and I didn’t even know how to correctly say “I’m so sorry. I feel really bad. Are you okay?” I just kept repeating “lo siento, lo siento” which was the best I could do at the time. And since she nannies for a family in our complex I knew I’d see her again, so I quick Googled how to say more to her to let her know I’m not a violent American who thinks I can punch people in the mouth. Thank God for Google.

*I don’t really have one specific instance, but many really, of awkward greetings/departures. It is pretty normal to “kiss” on the cheek when saying hello and goodbye to people you know. That information would’ve been helpful in the first month when I thought you just kissed EVERYONE you met. Hahaha, I was giving people cheek kisses that I didn’t know. I’m still trying to figure out the rhythm of the cheek-kiss/hug greeting vs. just the hug vs. just the cheek-kiss. I pretty much mess it up every time and it feels like an awkward first date. And sometimes it gets real touch-and-go when two foreigners are trying to greet each other and we mess it up pretty badly and almost kiss on the lips.

I’m pretty certain I have yet to say one whole sentence correctly in Spanish, unless it’s a sentence a baby could say. But if it involves an indirect object in the subjunctive tense, count me out. It can feel pretty frustrating that I don’t even know how to say “do you want me to do that for you?” correctly, but believe it or not, I’ve come a long way. I can totally apologize to someone now when I punch them in the face.

- M