It's certainly an odd day so far

[cjsmith]

1. Pick up visiting callers for the upcoming convention. Wait at the exit from customs for an hour and a half. The plane's been down for 45 minutes now. Where are they? Realize there's ANOTHER exit from customs. Oh, crud. At least I know how to say "I apologize."

2. Take them out to lunch. Fail utterly to explain what "spinach" is.

3. Arrive at work to find three voice mail messages. It's extremely unusual for me to get even one phone call in a day. Discover all of them are from my mother. Call mother back. She had a nightmare involving me being dead. OK. Reassure mother.

4. C'mon, painkillers. C'mooooooooooonnnnnn, painkillers.

Nap soon? Or a break? Or something??

Comments

[hnybny.livejournal.com]

Gooooooo baby go!

I sympathize.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Thanks! I think this has something to do with my yearly exam yesterday. A certain device, once installed, took a LONG time to settle down and stop being painful... and I think the doctor nudged it a bit. *sigh*!

[quasigeostrophy.livejournal.com]

So how did you try to explain what spinach is?

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

It is a vegetable, it is dark green leaves, it has a little more flavor than lettuce. (This was in the context of a spinach salad.) Best I could do. :-)

[quasigeostrophy.livejournal.com]

That sounds pretty good. Your situation reminded me of what I talked about in this post (http://www.livejournal.com/users/indyansel/481346.html). :-)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Except without the dictionary, yeah! I've also had similar situations in French. Unlike Japanese, I actually have a noticeable amount of French, so those discussions were always in that language rather than in English. I carried a pocket dictionary for the times my vocabulary wasn't up to the challenge. I learned a few odd food words by looking things up at dinner.

[quasigeostrophy.livejournal.com]

I can get by in French enough to get my face slapped or buy international post card stamps. :-)

Another funny language barrier story comes from back in high school when my friend A's mom was putting up some Polish refugees for a couple of weeks. I was at their house once soon after they arrived when A's mom was trying to ask if they were warm enough. She kept repeating the word "warm" and rubbing her own shoulders trying to get the message across. Noting their frustration at understanding, A looked at them and very pointedly said, "Not Cold." They got it immediately. :-)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

One of my advantages in language stuff isn't related to learning easily, but to how well I can cobble up communication with what I *do* have. I talk around stuff. If I want to see if someone is comfortable and I can't make a whole sentence, I can point to the temperature control in the car and say "Hot cold good?" When I don't know the word for "yesterday", I can hand-gesture a series of three things with the words "Tomorrow, today, what-is?" People laugh, I'm sure, but it works.

[quasigeostrophy.livejournal.com]

People laugh, I'm sure, but it works.

Trust me. That's how I managed a lot of my time in Braunschweig, where Germans, further from the tourist-beaten paths, didn't speak much English. And at some of the restaurants and even a game store in Paris. Didn't have to worry in Amsterdam. Wanted to practice some Dutch and was never given a chance - they all know English probably better than we do. :-)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Trust me.

I've been to Europe too, y'know. Lived there for a while. :)

[quasigeostrophy.livejournal.com]

Now I do remember. I had completely forgotten you lived there for a while. :-)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

What brought you to Germany? You haven't lived there, I take it, but you've traveled there multiple times?

[quasigeostrophy.livejournal.com]

Twice for work. I'm getting fuzzy on the years already, but I think the first time was in November of 2000. $FormerEmployer has a fairly large office in Braunschweig. On that trip I flew Indy -> Detroit -> Amsterdam (13-hour layover in Amsterdam - took the train into town to sightsee while braindead) -> Hannover. I was in Braunschweig for about a week.

The second time was in October of the following year. I went to Amsterdam for two days (visited a sales office in Hilversum), then on to Braunschweig for the rest of the week (where I took a short trip to Wolfsburg to see the big VW plant). Then on the weekend I went to Paris to visit another sales office. Toni met me there on Saturday and we wandered about before taking the EuroStar train through the Chunnel and checked out London for a few days before coming home. Total time in Europe for me that time was two weeks, for Toni one.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Oooo, work sending you overseas! I know it can get real old real fast, but I'm envious -- the only place work ever sent me was San Diego. :-)

[quasigeostrophy.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I was fortunate that work sent me a number of places I wouldn't have gotten to (or gotten to as much). Don't think I'll find a job with that again as easily. Aside from the 2 European trips, I got to see Salt Lake City (2-person engineering office); Seattle (twice - large developer/partner); Lowell, MA (satellite engineering/support office similar to what was in Indy (although I'd already been in that area plenty of times)); Missoula, MT (contract call center (totaling a rental car by hitting a deer)); and the SF Bay area (Mountain View HQ and Sausalito office) so many times I've lost count. :-)

[otterpop58.livejournal.com]

Ok, I'm guessing this wasn't a Canadian caller :)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

And you'd be right. Tim picked up the Canadians, I picked up the Japanese. :-)

nap.

[irascignavojo.livejournal.com]

and a hug, if welcome.

Re: nap.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

mmm, both sound nice! :-)

Re: nap.

[irascignavojo.livejournal.com]

anytime, dear. Just stay away from this link, ok?
http://tinyurl.com/c66ee

Re: nap.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

That doesn't sound difficult...

[cyan-blue.livejournal.com]

My cousin's boyfriend took over an hour to clear customs from Australia...

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

I saw the big pile of people come out from that flight... I know if they went out the other door around the same time, they were waiting for at least ten minutes. *sigh* Fortunately they seemed not at all discombobulated.

[(Anonymous)]

Must have been Kiyoshi. ;)

I'm picking up Sandie tonight. I've already promised her at least 15 minutes of cancer-stick time outside the terminal before heading to the car. [evil grin]

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

I sympathize with people who are strongly addicted and who have to fly. (Not enough to want to breathe smoke in a plane, but still I sympathize.)

While I was waiting for Kiyoshi I saw a guy who exited the wrong door from customs -- he wasn't connecting, he was stopping in SFO. He spoke only Japanese. I was able to point him to the elevator ("elevator over there is") and he turned back and pantomimed smoking. I knew exactly what he was asking -- where? -- but since we were on the wrong side, with no obvious path to any outside doors, I couldn't tell him! :-/

[jupiter29.livejournal.com]

I'm a bit late, but I hope you managed to get your nap in! :) I'd offer a hug, too, but I don't want to cross any lines. :) Sounds like you had a very interesting morning. But I always say, by the time you've managed to get it posted on LJ, the bad part is over and it's just a funny story. So sit back and enjoy the good part of it now. ;)

Yeah, okay, that's probably didn't help. I tried. ;)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

You're right -- by the time it gets posted the ending has already happened. :-)

[jupiter29.livejournal.com]

Exactly. Me, I just like telling stories, so as bad as it might be at the time, once I know everybody lived, I always figure 'Well, at least I get to tell other people and make them laugh.' It's some small consolation. :)