2 Languages 1 Convo

I went to down to Pentagon City Mall this weekend just so I could see what I was missing way up in the nothingness of Laurel/confirm I wasn't actually missing anything.  The technical name for the mall is "The Fashion Centre at Pentagon City" because the mall is basically filled with clothing stores.  Basically it looks like a big fancy Tyson's Corner or Columbia Mall.  The latter is 15 min from my house.  Needless to say, I wasn't impressed.

What did impress me were the pair of Ethiopian ladies that tried to goop me and confuse my mind with their east African trickery.

So I'm walking, right, and as I pass these two obvi Ethiopian ladies, one of them stops to ask me a question.  It went something like this:

Lady:  Excuse me...
Me:  Yesss...
Lady:  lawfhweufha awlifwei aowiefja;owe
Me:  *literally pauses for like 10 sec and stares blankly* what??...
Lady:  *looks at me like I'm playing a trick on her* How do you get to Macy's?
Me:  Oh...yeah...this is my first time in here so I don't know where anything is.  Sorry...
Lady:  That's OK *walks away*

OK, America, I think know I'm not crazy, but now I'm starting to second guess myself.  I know she said "excuse me" in English...that's how I knew she was talking to me.  But her second question was def not in English...at least I think.  I literally couldn't understand a word she said...I couldn't even make out the word "Macy's", and that's an English word.  I mean, I know I  must have looked like a dang fool to her because I remember that pause being hella long.  Sometimes I'll hear things in English but they might sound funny or the person said it really fast so it doesn't compute in my mind, thus I assume it's not English.  I don't think this was the case; I think ol' girl for real switched up the languages on me mind convo.  She trapped me with English then came strong with the Amharic from behind.  Didn't even see ti coming; I'm impressed.

Now I'll have to be weary of English-speaking Ethiopians too...

Tale of the Ethiopian Whisperer

Had an adorable moment today at a grocery/drug store by the gym:

Chevy Chase, MD

So I walk into Rodman's store, right.  As soon as I walked in I realized everyone was Ethiopian, and as I later found out, the store was owned by a father-son duo of...you guessed it, Ethiopian decent.

So I walk in, right...  everybody gives me suspect eye.  I turned down an aisle looking for eggs...the entire aisle turned and looked at me like I had walked in on some kind of secret Ethiopian mafia meeting or something.

Needless to say that wasn't the right aisle.

So I finally find the eggs and go to the checkout line.  I checkout with no problem.  As I turn to leave, the cashier from the other registers whispers in the softest most adorable voice ever,

"Salaam...hi..."

Now I knew what he said before the English part, and I knew it was directed at me.  I even knew how to respond.  My immediate hesitation was prompted the English translation.  But his little whispery voice was too ador to ignore, so I eventually turned around and smiled back.

I felt bad because I didn't want goop the man into thinking I'm one of his peeps, although I may have inadvertently done that by smiling.  I honestly wanted to respond in Amharic...took everything in me to just smile and walk away.

If he keeps whispering like that I might have to actually respond.  He don't want this work.


Now that I know my brethren are running the joint I'll be shopping there quite often.  That plus the fact that they had pints of blueberries for $1.99.  That's better than Wal-Mart.  My people ball so hard.