Bilingual People Share Their Greatest “I Didn’t Know You Spoke the Language” Stories

Turning Red

I had gone over to a friend’s house to play cards. I knew a few of the people there, but not everyone. So we are all sitting on the floor, I’m getting ready to deal, and one of the guys playing says (in Hindi) to my friend, basically, “So where did you pick up the lady from?,” with a wink-wink, nudge-nudge in his voice.

I’m not even good with witty comebacks in English, so I just snapped my head up and looked right into the guy’s eyes with a “shut up” look (by the way, this works better than witty comebacks or badly-pronounced expletives in a foreign language). My friend told him, “She speaks Hindi. And we work together.” I have never seen a brown guy turn that bright red. 104wpr