When Words Fail...

That Tower of Babel thing really has had a lasting impact. I have an inherent interest in foreign languages, and I am truly in awe of people who have mulit-lingual skills, because I know learning other languages is not an easy task.

Bruce's mother's side of the family is Greek. His materal grandparents emigrated from Greece a century ago. I'm not Greek, and while they welcomed me warmly to the family, sometimes, because of language, I stood out like a sore thumb. One summer, a large contingency of Yia Yia's (Grk. for grandma) family came to visit from Greece, and they didn't speak English. Yia Yia hosted a dinner that we all attended. After dinner, I wanted to be impressively helpful, so I volunteered to go around to all of the tables to offer coffee refills. I had purposefully learned how to say "would you like more coffee" in Greek, and was very proud of myself. The theas and theos smiled at me gracously, and responded, "Neh, Neh...", so I just smiled back ... and walked away, thinking they weren't big coffee drinkers. I was acutely aware of strange reactions and puzzled stares, but I wrote it off to cultural differences. Later that night, I was proudly telling Bruce about my linguistic prowess and he started laughing. Turns out "Neh" in Greek means 'yes', and they were all no doubt wondering why I offered them coffee and then just walked away.

A few years ago, Bruce and I were in Paris for a few days. I had lovingly taught him how to say a few phrases in French, in case he got lost or something ;) When we needed to ask for directions or information, I would take extra time to mentally form the question perfectly because I was rusty in my speaking skills. Invariably, Bruce would grow impatient waiting for me to speak and he'd spout off his few conquered phrases, to which the French would respond, ...in French. I was still busy formulating the perfect question in my mind, so I missed their reponse, and embarassed, once again, I just smiled and ...walked away, acutely aware of strange reactions and puzzled stares. I stoicly glared at Bruce, rather than kick him.

So, a little bit of knowledge can be a precarious thing, especially when it's combined with pride or pretense. Before stepping out to ask the questions, we should've prepared ourselves to interpret the answers. Or perhaps we should've stuck with what we knew. It's been said that the most exhausting thing you can do is to not be yourself :)