Multilingual people of Reddit, what have you heard in a meeting that you weren’t supposed to, because the participants didn’t know you speak their language?
Multilingual people of Reddit, what have you heard in a meeting that you weren’t supposed to, because the participants didn’t know you speak their language?
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one time when i was in a school bored meeting two teachers were talking in spanish, see idk very much but the basics and i heard them say bufanda aka scarf and i was the only one in the meeting wearing one and then i heard after scarf the spanish word for ugly, not really too big but my feelings got hurt lol
It wasn’t a meeting, but we had someone from a different store come in to help us. I was told by my Spanish speaking coworkers not to let her know I spoke Spanish so she would talk shit about me without realizing I understood every word. When I greeted her with possibly the most “white American” “¿Hola, como estas?” I could muster up, she said “Muy bien, cara verga.” Which basically translates to “Very good, dickhead.”
Wasn’t really a meeting but close enough..
I’m a white American. I mostly speak English but know a tiny bit of Spanish. I live in a majority Hispanic area, and while I’m not fluent in Spanish, I do know some very basic Spanish, and have been in a few situations where I’ve had to use it before.
Anyways a while back I got a new job and I was basically the only white guy. I mostly got along with everyone but there was one guy that really didn’t like me much, not fully sure why.
One day I was working on my machine and I was pretty sure someone had changed some settings on it, seemingly intentionally. I won’t go into detail but not only was it an asshole thing to do, but would’ve wasted a lot of company money and potentially been dangerous for me to run the machine with the settings like that.
I overheard the dude in Spanish talking to another guy basically saying something to the effect of “we can screw the guerro, he’ll probably never even know”
I switched all my settings back right in front of him, turned around and told him in Spanish “vete a la mierda wey”
His face got bright red and he looked embarrassed as hell. It was a small win, felt good.
That being said I’m sure people still get one over on me plenty because of the language barrier. You win some you lose some
I wasn’t working but in college, it was a French college and we were an English course (aircraft structures). The instructors right in front of us would say we are doing things wrong or that they think _____ doesn’t get the point, etc but would never actually correct us or say anything. One day I finally replied back in French “so TELL him.” And the two were absolutely shocked and said in French “you understand us??”. I can’t tell you how often I’ve caught French people talking shit right in front the person/people, assuming they/we/I don’t understand. In Canada it is quite common to learn both so…. Idk why they would do it so blatantly and then act shocked everytime someone understands.
Back when I was a research student I taught undergraduate basic IT. The university I was at had a lot of Greek students at the time. My research partner was Greek, so taught me a lot of Greek insults and the like. Anyway, whilst teaching a bunch of Greek undergrads they were calling me a wanker and all sorts of stuff 😂 I didn’t acknowledge it, eventually won them round and they were ok at the end.
Last day of teaching I thanked them all for their participation and hard work. In Greek. Lots of red faces.
😎😎😎
In an elevator I’ve heard a company president lament in Japanese to his flunkies how bad his diarrhea was that morning.
Getting off at my floor I told him my sympathies and wished him good health soon.
Okay not a meeting but just around.
So I am South African and speak Afrikaans- however my accent is very British to the average South African ear.
I was at my friends sisters house – she struggles with her weight and is a bigger girl. At the same time I was there, the electricians where there – Afrikaans men.
They were speaking in mixed Afrikaans and Zulu (which I also know as studied this as my 2nd language) and were saying she is quite fat and going on and on about it – it was very mean!
( Its is worth mentioning that my friends sister is very British but lives in South Africa. She doesn’t understand a word of Afrikaans etc.)
Obvs I never said anything to my sisters friend but as they were leaving I replied to them in fluent Zulu and they were gobsmacked.
Not a meeting, but many years ago I was hearing some Arabic dudes talking about how that woman looks so beautiful (in Arabic), I think I recognized the dialect as Syrian, close enough at least for me to understand as I’ve been with an Iraqi man who taught me Arabic in both the dialect of Baghdad and Mosul but also a little Syrian. I’m Dutch and they clearly did not expect I could even understand a single word they spoke. I looked around seeing if they could mean anyone other then me, and when I realized the nearest woman wasn’t anywhere close to me and they were kinda giving stealthy glances in my direction as they were praising my beauty, I just friendly smiled at them and spoke in fluent Arabic back, thanking them for the compliment, and then quickly left with a huge grin on my face before they could recover from their open mouthed stares.
I went to school with a lot of Greek kids. I knew most of the swear words. I was a diner in the USA in Silver Springs, Maryland, and the servers were obviously Greek, and they were saying “malaka” this and “malaka” that. When we paid our bill, I told the cashier that I knew what “malaka” was, and maybe the staff could keep that to the kitchen. She turned bright red. I know no other Greek than swear words, so yeah…
End of a taxi ride in the middle east.
The driver called over a passer-by to translate arabic to english for me (i’m a white european). They were talking across me so I could hear everything they were saying.
In arabic the driver said the journey cost 10, the passer-by instantly translated this into english as 20. I retorted in arabic that he said it was 10.
They both pulled back a little, laughed, and accepted 10.
Am guessing there were bits that I didn’t understand where they both agreed to up the price.
Lots of stuff but some highlights.
Mexican lady at work said to her ride “wait for me I gotta take a shit”. I almost died
I was minding my own business on a train platform in Thailand and one lady said to the other “Its ok if he’s fat, he’s cute”. I’m still not sure what I think about that.
Edit: I’m not really that fat I’m just kind of big in a western way
I grew up in Asia amongst many Chinese people and understand a few dialects. Nobody would look at me and guess that today and where I live. I also have RBF, tattoos, and look like I’m going to chew your head off. But deep deep down I’m just a teddy bear.
I sometimes supervise graduate student projects for work. One group in particular had a few Chinese students who sometimes communicate amongst themselves in Chinese.
At one point during a meeting I asked the students “do you have any problems with the tasks from last week?” One person said this quietly in Mandarin: “you should tell him”, which received the reply “no you tell him”.
I replied in mandarin “tell me what?”
Them (mandarin) “you speak mandarin? Why do you speak Mandarin?”
Me (mandarin) “no I don’t speak Mandarin”
Me (English) “what do you have to tell me?”
That broke the ice a bit. We had a better working relationship after that.
ETA: a few asked what it was they had to say. I’ve replied to u/howdoidothiz below.
Not me, nor a meeting, but it happened to my cousin.
For a time she was a flight attendant, and she and some other ones (who were also Latina) started remarking on how cute a new pilot (who was white) was in Spanish.
He introduces himself in Spanish, adding that he went on a church mission to Paraguay for some time.
Not a meeting, but still funny. I’m a white guy living in South Africa, and I can understand Zulu, which is predominantly spoken by black people in my country. I’m also 6ft9 in height. All I hear all day in my movements is tantamount to, “Jesus, this guy’s tall.” Some guys will even shout it to their friends across the room or store thinking I do not understand. I then speak a little Zulu back to them and they figure out I do undertand and feel a little shy, but we all have a good laugh. I fucking love my country and its people.
My wife Indonesian but she hasn’t taught me Bahasa. So one time when we were visiting her parents and her aunts and female cousins were there they were talking soI just hopped on my lap top to pass time.
Anyway at some stage I didn’t know exactly what they saying but I knew they were talking about me. So I lifted my head and said to them “I know you’re talking about me” Well their mouths dropped and they went bright red.
My friend was born in South America but she sounded like a tv news reporter. She worked at a place for 10 years and they never knew she spoke Spanish. The day she quit she burst out in a perfectly spoken 5 minute farewell and left them with their jaws on the floor. She said it was so satisfying to see those gossipy coworkers get their comeuppance.
Not a meeting, but I overheard gossip from these two Filipino ladies making snide comments about people around them for no reason. Then they brought ME up (like wtf did I do man) saying I dressed “like that” because I probably didn’t grow up in a god fearing household (crop top and joggers wtf).
So I went to their table and said, “could you repeat that? I didn’t hear the part about my clothes” in Tagalog; I’m half Chinese so they didn’t think I was Filipino. But they had the nerve to get mad at ME for eavesdropping?? Either way, they stopped talking shit about me when I was around lol
I speak English natively and a bit of mandarin, I’ve been on the train in Singapore a few times and over heard old ladies talking about me in mandarin, one time they were talking to their friend about me being attractive, another time they were talking about me being fat and entitled, such a stark swing, different pairs of old ladies. Each time I’ve just told them thank you and to have a nice day in mandarin after. The first group laughed in good humour, the second were shocked.
Not me, and not as meeting.
But a previous colleague of mine (White British) married a Middle Eastern man and knows a bit of Arabic as they lived in Dubai for a while for work. We worked in a grocery store at the time, and she heard two older customers talking about how slow her till was and how she should hurry more. Colleague slowed down further, and when she got to them, she greeted them perfectly in Arabic and apologised for being slow. They didn’t speak the rest of the transaction.
Not in a meeting but on a hiking track in Japan, where guys behind me speaking my native language talked about ‘something weird involving goats’ and said “I hope that guy in front of us doesn’t understand us, else it would be quite embarrassing”.
I just turned my head around with a big smile. Anyways, descent guys, we hiked down together.
As many others not in a meeting. And have experienced it too many times to count as I speak 7 languages including Mandarin Chinese. Went to a shop to buy some socks in China, guy in front of me were buying the same and the shopkeeper said ‘don’t let her see the change I give you so I can charge her more’ I insisted on paying less
Also had some guys on a train in Denmark speaking French talking quite vividly about what they would like to do to me naked. Their faces were priceless when I got up to get off and said ‘Thank you, but you are not my types in French.
Aww, man, I could be here all day, but I’ll tell you – Italians don’t hold back! The number of times I’ve had the satisfaction of watching an Italian’s skin crawl off their body when they realise. That said, many of them DGAF either. It’s beautiful.
Shop Assistant 1 – why did she come in here? Nothing will fit her.
Shop Assistant 2 – wow these fat girls think they can just put anything on.
Me in actual dialect – i can’t help it, it’s the way your dad wants me – puts hand out for a shake– call me mamma.
A group of tourist girls in public transport were pressed up against me because of the crush and one of them said in their native language (Swedish) “look at that idiot with his jacket above his head”.
The idiot was me.
I replied to her in her language that I had a project for Uni wrapped in my jacket and I was protecting it against the crush, and I even unwrapped it a bit to show her, but she didn’t see it because by that time she was looking red-faced at the floor while her friends were giggling.
Technically my native language, but anyway.
I was on vacation and I was taking public transport. I was on my own at that moment, so nobody knew what languages I spoke.
A group of girls (18-22yo or so) got on the bus, and immediately started judging everyone in their and my native language. I wished them a nice day in our language when they got off.
Not me personally, but I used to work for Samsung in the UK in the early noughties. There was a German there who was fluent in German (obviously), English, and Korean. He used to tell me how the Koreans would openly criticise and make fun of the Westerners in Korean in front of them, but would shut up once he walked into the room/earshot.
The German was untouchable because he was techically on secondment to the UK office from Samsung Germany, but the Koreans at the German office had wised up the UK office before his arrival that he could speak the language.
A long time ago, a friend was stopped by German police. They flatly refused to use English with him, knowing he didn’t speak German. It must have been an act of God that empowered them because as soon as his other half spoke in German (her being German and all), they were fluent in English.
Not a meeting, but I used to work in close spaces with a man who was newly-wed to his French wife. He would take phone calls from her and with nowhere to go, I would try to politely tune it out (we weren’t allowed to have headphones due to safety concerns). I got to hear some very sweet conversations. Hearing him tell her how much he missed her and loved her was very cute. I never told him, or anyone I knew. It’s none of my business.
I’m a white dude that speaks Mandarin and lived in China for a decade, I’ve heard it all… Not just in meetings, but on the street, in restaurants, on the subway, everywhere.
I’m a dumb fat foreigner.
I’m a white monkey.
I couldn’t have possibly completed that task because I’m just a dumb foreigner.
I’d fuck that guy. (Much appreciated)
Go walk by him and grab his dick/pinch his ass. (Not appreciated)
He’s tall.
He’s fat.
What is he? Is he Russian? No, he’s too fat he must be American.
Look at him pretending to read the menu/newspaper.
Why’s he in here (a Chinese language film), he’s not gonna be able to understand anything.
That’s disgusting, all they come here for is to take our jobs and our women (lololol)
I hate seeing foreigners with our/Chinese women.
Oh wow he can actually use chopsticks.
Oh, he can eat spicy food.
Wait, they actually like to eat that?!?! (Stinky tofu)
I was the one talking when I didn’t expect it. I was security at an airport, and someone from my staff asked me about some random passenger’s flight time. That passenger was walking very wobbly, and it looked like he was wasted, which I also said to my coworker, assuming with his non-local passport he doesn’t speak our language. Then the person answered in my language that he’s not drunk, he’s just handicapped and that he knows it can seem suspicious that way.
I apologized and never assumed someone didn’t speak my language ever again…
Nowhere near fluent, but taught myself a ton of Russian growing up for funsies. I was out working construction for my asshole of an uncle. He liked to hire “immigrants who would work for cheaper” – the area we were in had a huge Russian community, so he often had Russian workers back then. I overheard two of the workers talking about what an absolute prick he was as I walked past on a job. It felt absolutely delightful to agree with them and throw in my two cents, and to reassure them my uncle only spoke English, I’m just the odd one out. Kinda miss those guys, since we talked shit about my uncle the rest of the time I worked with them!
Not a meeting, but my ex spoke to his friend in their mother tongue as he didn’t realize I understood (thanks to knowing languages that are from the same language family). My ex was talking about how he missed his ex and how he still couldn’t get over her, etc. I was sitting next to him at the table. We broke up shortly after. That man was a devil, and him choosing to speak in the language he thought I wouldn’t understand to speak about another woman was the smallest of the things, and I should have left sooner.
I taught English in local high schools in Indonesia for a few years. I used to pretend not to understand Indonesian so my students would be forced to rely on their English to communicate with me. One morning I was doing roll call and a student was missing. I kept asking in English if anyone knew where he was and they all kept saying no. One of his friends asked his group in Indonesian if they knew – one of the boys replied “he’s taking a shit” and I burst out laughing and blew my cover. The one who said it was mortified to have sworn in front of a teacher who knew what he was saying.
Not in a meeting, but I was on a flight. I spent a few years in Indonesia due to my parents’ work, so I speak the language fluently. This couple was in the window and middle seat, I was in the aisle seat (selected and paid for it in advance as I use the toilet a lot).
They asked if I could change seats to the window seat, I said sorry, I needed the aisle seat. They then talked to each other in Bahasa Indonesia, saying they would drink lots of water so they will go to the toilet a lot and inconvenient me the whole flight.
I laughed and kept quiet, and waited for them to do this during the flight. Sadly, they didn’t do what they had plotted to do lol
Not a meeting but the guys who worked on my bathroom REALLY hated their boss. He broke several labour laws so I don’t blame them
I’m a resident in a nursing facility. Many of the staff here are Filipino. When they are “working on me” they are often conversing between themselves in Tagalog. I am as white as Wonder Bread. When they are finished I say the only two words of Tagalog that I know “Salamat po” (sp?). “Thank you.”. The reaction when they suddenly think I understood the whole conversation is fun to behold.
All I’ve learned from this thread about other people is they talk a lot of shit and love to gossip.
Pretty girl at a college house party telling her friend she thought I was cute and she was going to jump my bones that very evening.
Surely I capitalized on that extremely valuable information? I did not because I’m an idiot and cock blocked my own self.
I trained to be a Japanese translator / interpreter but don’t have a drop of Asian blood in me so no one would ever know unless I told them. At one point in my career I worked at a company with a lot of Japanese colleagues and was on a call with them and some non-Japanese speaking employees. After some heated back and forth, the Japanese colleagues asked if they could switch to Japanese to talk internally. The first thing out of their mouths was “why don’t these Americans ever listen? They are so difficult to work with!”. I had to put myself on mute to laugh about it. I signed off the call in Japanese just to make them sweat a bit.
I sound English because I was born & raised in the UK. My parents were immigrants from Asia so although I’m not fluent in speaking their language I can understand 90% of it because I’m used to hearing to often.
I used to work in a call centre in my youth & often when a customer who couldn’t speak English but spoke my parents language called up they’d have a relative with them to translate. I caught quite a few relatives blatantly lying about what our customers had asked them to say in English. Some were trying to defraud them (financial products). They were sent straight to the fraud dept & the accounts locked down. From then on those customers dealt with us directly with our own interpreters.
I speak Japanese as a second language and was working at an Izakaya in the Bay Area while in college, but I also studied Mandarin and Korean. I have two stories.
One, I was dating a Korean guy but we went to an all Japanese party in LA. There was a handsome guy so in Korean I told my then BF that guy was kinda cute.
The guy went from speaking in Japanese and thanked me in Korean. He was half, his mom was from Busan. Oops.
Then 7 years later, I’m working at the Izakaya, and a lot of the customers were Japanese, Chinese, and Korean.
There were these two Chinese guys looking at the menu. Now our chef was finicky, we couldn’t guarantee how long your item would come out, cause he didn’t go by order. So they are asking me questions about how long they would take and what the chef has, and we legit won’t know until the order was put in.
I sheepishly apologized for not knowing and being unable to give a clear answer, but one guy got grumpy and said to his friend in Mandarin “Well she doesn’t know anything! What do you want to drink?”. I blinked, and responded in Mandarin, “yeah, what DO you want to drink?”
Grumpy guy looked embarrassed and after they ordered a drink they left. You could hear him say curse words in embarrassment.
Not in a meeting, but in an elevator, with my family visiting me in Tokyo. We were speaking French when a group of construction workers, all in their 50s, came in. They listened to us for a bit and one ended up asking his co-workers what language we were speaking. They tried to guess. When we got down, I told them in Japanese that we were speaking French. I hope I didn’t make them feel too embarrassed… It was just fun to hear them hypothesize.
My whole dept, along with this same dept in other countries of my multinational company, was being outsourced and laid off. The official line was that we weren’t performing to par and they needed to standardize across countries and improve efficiency and accuracy. Which we knew was crazy because even the govt auditors were always impressed by how clean and thorough our books were. Anyway, head office (another country) came to do some in-office work related to the outsourcing and I heard them say what a shame it was that our numbers were going to tank after this because there was no way they could do it as well as us. I asked them about it (hot tip: always assume someone can understand you when sharing company secrets at the office). Apparently they had considered outsourcing the other countries to us when they decided to standardize because we had the best numbers, but we would have been too expensive. It didn’t change anything about our situation but did make us feel better about the work we had done as they had made it seem like it was our fault for underperforming.
i live in a country where 60% of the population speaks dutch only 35% speaks french only and 5% speaks german only
i was waiting in a train station next to a group of german pensioner ladies, presumably tourists, were standing in a circle discussing why the train was so delayed and if the next train was gonna be the right one
after 10 minutes of this, one of the ladies walks up to me and first tries to start the conversation in french, realised she couldnt really get a sentence going, then explained her problem in english(more or less broken but still understandable).
after a few minutes of this i explained to her in german that the next train isn’t gonna be the right one, the train they’re supposed to take is 10 minutes delayed(showed her the billboard around the corner where you could see the updated tracking info) and told her im a linguisitics student so i understood everything they were saying. her look was quite funny
I was on a ship entering a transit strait and I was the only crew member who spoke the language. I was to accompany the executive officer and harbor pilot to translate and I heard the pilot say to his assistant that he was going to fail the ship and to look out for as many deficiencies as possible. I radioed the captain and told him. He sent another crew member to fix the issues as they were getting reported. We continued as scheduled.
It turns out that strait was notorious for sending you back to the end of the line if you failed inspection, often times it would encourage bribery to get back ahead of line and would cost the ship extra in fuel to move about until it was their turn again.
Working in a Toronto bank, we were interviewing a contract firm from Montreal. The two parties start talking shit about us in French. My boss, who knew I spoke the language, kicks me under the table, with a very subtle head shake. After giving the potential firm’s employees enough rope to hang themselves, I let them know the meeting was over and wished them a safe trip home…in perfect Montreal French. Salut la visite!
Not a work situation, but I was at the airport and handed over my phone to the Chinese customs person. It was an older model and she laughed at it and said in Mandarin that she wouldn’t even give it to her dog to play with. Then in English she says I can move on. I reply in English that she has my phone. She repeats in English for me to move on, to which I reply in Mandarin “That’s my phone.” Cue her face turning red and her coworkers laughing their asses off.
I’m an app driver in my spare time, I live in a touristic city in México, lots of foreigners. I drove a bunch of french teens (all female) from the city to the beach. During the whole trip they were telling each other how ugly, fat and dumb looking I was. I kept to myself, then I pulled over on the side of the highway and told them I could understand everything they were saying and to please get out of my car. The look on their faces still makes my day when I remember.
I was at a bus stop with three teenagers who were speaking Spanish. When I initially came up they were making fun of me for a bit, then they returned to what they were talking about. The girl asked what time it was, and I answered.
The next few minutes waiting for the bus was awkward for them, they stopped talking completely.
The other way around – I get asked to say something in Irish a lot when I’m abroad (I don’t speak it, we did a horrendously shit job of teaching Irish in schools), but I have a few bits memorised.
Anyway, I got caught rotten reciting the Our Father in Irish in front of a load of very, very non Catholic people by another Irish person. I’d passed it off as poetry. He nearly ate his knuckles trying not to laugh.
Was walking through Costco just doing some shopping when a couple walked past staring at me and said to each other in Spanish “I can’t believe they let the Walmart shoppers in here now”.
I didn’t know whether or not to say anything because I wasn’t sure whether or not to get offended or just laugh. I know I’m ugly, but damn that one kinda hurt!
I’m a tall Black dude, and while in Japan, one day I was wearing my (now old) green hoodie and walked past a couple of guys who said something to the effect of “ゴジラに似ている!” (he looks like Godzilla!).
So I made a quick “rawwr!” sound and the monster thing with my hands and kept on walking. Their shocked expressions were hilarious.
Train ride, I sat down opposite to two teenage girls. First they complained that I decided to sit there, then one of them asked if I might understand them (they spoke one of our official languages, but there’s maybe 20’000 people left who speak that particular variation) which they agreed that they would have heard that when I asked if the seats were taken.
After that they talked about their crushes and how they were hoping to have sex soon. That’s when I decided to listen to music because I knew I wouldn’t be able to keep a straight face. When I left the train I told them to have a nice evening and good luck with their plans… in that particular language. Their reaction was priceless.
Wasn’t in a meeting but I was in a quite cafe just outside of Melbourne Australia with my Belgian wife and this Dutch guy was telling his Dutch mate about the sex he had last night but was going into lots of disturbing details that he would not have openly shared in public.
He thought he was safe to speak Dutch in this random cafe outside of a city on the other side of the world.
Never assume no one speaks your language.
A group of guys in back of me in the receiving line at a wedding reception were making disparaging comments about the bride. Probably thought that someone who was 2 color shades to the left of milk wouldn’t know what they were saying. You could hear the sound of their faces hitting the floor when I turned and said they should be careful talking about others because you never know who understands what you are saying.
edit: spellling
Not me, my Dad. He’s the whitest looking man, white blonde hair and blue eyes and he has a thick Southern accent. But he lived most of his life in West San Antonio, where he ran his pharmacy.
They had a tradition of not telling the new employees he spoke Spanish. After about a week, or as long as they could not break, he’d just make a comment on something they said and they’d all have a laugh. My Mom is also Mexican American. Most people speak Spanish in the area. It’s silly to assume anyone doesn’t here and it’s a good lesson for dealing with their paler customers.
One time though he overheard his employee talking about her being beaten by her husband. She had come in with a broken arm. My Dad talked to Mom and they helped get her out and back on her feet. I was little so I don’t remember the details but they were staying at our place for a minute. Mom worked in the system (mostly for disabled adults though) so she knew how to get her out safely, how to talk to the police and what government agencies and help was available. Well she also knew a lot because of her ex-husband unfortunately but that’s a different long story.
The Amish speak “Pennsylvania Dutch”, a bastardized form of low German that even some Germans can’t understand. They have good reason to believe no outsider can understand them.
A high school friend (17M) was leaving a restaurant. Two Amish girls were sitting on the front steps. One said, “That one has a nice ass.” He thanked her in PA Dutch. Red faces and giggles all around.
At work, I was cleaning a machine and making a mess. An Amish farmer watching commented, “Does this dumb ass know what he’s doing?” I replied, “Yes I do.” To his credit, I got a formal apology.
Multi racial adoptions happen among the Amish. Sadly, latent racism usually means that the adoptees have to leave the Amish to find a life partner. Having grown up in that culture and faith, they are Amish on the inside but can’t make a life in the faith because they are the wrong color on the outside.
I know one, a black man now in his 30’s, 6’2”, built like a linebacker and no longer Amish. He was visiting his family in Pinecraft (an Amish settlement in Sarasota, FL). He saw two elderly Amish women coming toward him on the sidewalk.
“Watch out for that big black one. He will run you off the path,” one said to the other in PA Dutch.
He replied in PA Dutch, “with our tongue we speak bad words against men who are made like God.” (From the Bible, James 3:9). He then stepped politely aside so they could pass.
I heard this story from both sides (from him soon after it happened and through the Amish grapevine in Ohio a year later). I like to think it had a lasting effect on Amish behavior.
At a corporate retreat, two German execs sitting near me were griping about how the meeting was a waste of time—‘Wir könnten genauso gut mit der Wand reden’ (‘We might as well be talking to the wall’). I waited until the Q&A, then raised my hand and said in perfect German, ‘Soll ich die Wand fragen, ob sie verstanden hat?’ (‘Should I ask the wall if it understood?’). The look on their faces? Priceless. The rest of the meeting? Suddenly very productive.
Not me and also not a meeting, but my grandma is Lithuanian and grew up speaking Lithuanian. She stopped speaking it when they moved to the US and she learned English. Once I asked my mom if she’d ever heard my grandma speak it (because I hadn’t) and she said yes but only once:
My mom was in a department store with my grandma and they were on the elevator with a couple of women speaking Lithuanian. Apparently my grandma went off on them in Lithuanian because they were talking about how gross her legs looked. She would only tell my mom that she told the ladies that they were not being very nice, but my mom suspects they were cussed out.
I have lived out in rural Mexico for a while now so speak pasable Spanish at this point and, as a 6′ 250# gringo with long hair i kinda stand out in the area. I regularly go to the bakery and the owner knows me and greets me with a big smile when i come in.
One day i walk to the counter and it’s staffed by her 11 year old daughter, who I’ve never met before. She looks up at me, eyes wide as saucers, doesn’t say a word, and starts for the back in fear. Her mom looks up from the ovens in the back and sees me, then looks at the kid and says, it’s OK, he speaks Spanish.
The kid turns around, still uncertain, but ready to give it a try and i look at her and say, yes, of course I speak Spanish… in loud, gringo English!
The kid looks at me terrified, and then the mom starts laughing and the kid gets the joke and i get my concha!
Slightly off topic to the question, but funny nonetheless.
I’m not terribly bilingual but I speak a bit of Spanish. Enough to perform a medical assessment and have some conversation with my patients on the ambulance.
I once worked a job where I had two regular partners. Both Hispanic, and neither one spoke a word of Spanish. Of course, working in Florida meant I was working with a significant Spanish-speaking population. Every single time we went into a spanish-speaking home, people would start rattling stuff off to my partners, and every time, they’d point to me. The number of old Puerto Rican guys that would immediately say “¿el gringo?” never stopped being funny to me.
And then I’d muddle my way through my assessment.
One of my friends is American by birth but has lived in Japan for 20 years. His wife doesn’t speak much English.
He overhears the most racist shit. The funniest thing is the responses of horror and embarrassment as he gently and respectfully encourages Japanese businessmen to be more polite and more professional.
Was in a French Canadian department store installing prototype fixtures- store manager saying to his colleague – we’ll wait till they leave and just take it down, they have no idea what they are doing – referencing myself, and their head office planning department.
I asked in English for their feedback – they said we love it, can’t wait to see how it works. Followed in French by “can’t this guy just fucking leave “
I answered in French that I’d leave when I was done and I’ll be back randomly with pictures to validate the test.
It was very quiet for quite some time after that!
I was checking into a 90,000tshs room in a hotel in Tanzania a few days ago and the manager told the receptionist in Swahili to charge me 120,000tshs. I cut her off, challenged her in Swahili and said the room is 90,000tshs and she instantly slunk backwards and told the receptionist to charge the lower amount. That felt quite satisfying.
When I went on a college trip to Japan, we were in the customs line at the airport when an elderly Japanese woman in line behind us started making all sorts of snide comments about us as foreigners. Most of the people in my group knew either very basic Japanese or none at all. I wasn’t fluent by any means, but knew enough that she was talking smack. So I turned around and told her in Japanese I’d been excited for the trip because I’d heard Japanese people were SO KIND.
The look on her face was priceless.
Being called a maricon ( fag) by Mexican tile layers in my own home while renovating my home and talking amongst themselves in front of me . I look like a very white man. I told them in perfect Spanish ( which I speak well ) to get the hell out of my house immediately, that they were fired and I did this in front of their boss. They didn’t come back.
I went for a manicure/pedicure and all the staff were Chinese.
I’m mixed race and learnt a bit of Mandarin at secondary school.
During the pedicure, I noticed that the beautician was staring at her colleague and that they were laughing under their breath. Until the colleague asked the beautician: “Are you all right? Are you going to survive?
And the beautician replied: “Fuck, I hate dealing with black people feets, it disgusts me, I’ve got to get this over with as soon as possible!
I was really shocked, quite shaky as well and got up, and said in Madarin : “If I disgust you, then I’m leaving, and of course I won’t pay anything. And I went to the door.
The shock on their faces…
They tried to stop me saying “oh but, but, but there’s been a mistake…we weren’t talking about you blah blah”.
(I was the only black person around).
I’m a middle-aged white woman living and working in hillbilly country. I’m also fairly fluent in Spanish after years of study and working with immigrants through our church. I worked Asset Protection in a big box store and we caught someone using an old receipt as a shopping list as they were trying to push it all out the door. Brought them back to the office, start paperwork etc. with them sitting on the bench acting all confused and shell-shocked. They make a call to their “cousin” who’s waiting for them in the parking lot and start speaking in Spanish while acting like a scared little kid. They were telling their outside accomplice that they’d been made, which lawyer to call and which stores the others should try next. I included everything in the paperwork but didn’t let them know I understood what they were saying. Some cards should stay close to the vest.
I worked retail in college. I speak fluent German, but I live in Arkansas – we’re not exactly known for our German population. Anyways, I live a few miles from the main Walmart HQ, so we get folks coming to visit from all around the world. There was a couple in line at the aforementioned retail job just bitching their heads off about how bad the town smelled in German. So when they made it to the register I was sweet as pie and spoke to them in German. They were not expecting this hillbilly-looking-ass kid in the middle of nowhere to speak German.
My friend who understands French was on a subway train in NYC across from two girls speaking in French, obviously assuming no one else could understand.
One girl was telling a sexy story about herself with a humorous punchline at the end. When she said it, all 3 of them laughed. An awkward silence ensued.
Onsen in Japan. I am a reasonably fat white woman.
There were two pre teen/early teen girls in there with their grandmother.
Girl 1: wow look at the white woman over there
Girl 2: she’s really fat
Grandma: don’t be so rude.
Girl 1: she can’t understand us
Grandma: it doesn’t matter you shouldn’t be so rude.
Me: also some white people can understand Japanese.
Girls suddenly so embarrassed they can’t look at me
Their grandmother made them apologise but they were all embarrassed and left quickly. Since their grandma was quick to correct them even when she thought I had no idea what was being said I think they had appropriate adult role models and hope they learned a lesson.