Mr. Feng

When it comes to language-learning, it can be a pretty brutal butt-whipping process; so I take what little victories I can get.

Today, on the way back home from dinner, I got into the front seat of a taxi next to a jolly taxi driver. Right away, he started chatting it up with us. I made what jokes I could in the Main language, and he actually laughed! I knew then that this would be a good cab ride home. We talked about how I look like a local, but am actually a foreigner (which was followed by the usual long rundown of my family history to explain this phenomenon). Then after I'd exhausted just about every dialogue I can remember from my seven weeks of class, he started talking about something I'd never learnt. Being gracious though, he kept trying to repeat the words slower and slower (like that was going to change the fact that I've only been learning this language for two months!) But PTL, something clicked around his fifth attempt, and I realized he was talking about our gov't and the elections coming up! So I did my best to explain that our current leader isn't all bad, sometimes war may be necessary, but we're not a war-happy people, being president isn't an easy job, and why I'm not voting this year. Although I didn't agree with everything he was saying in response, I was definitely entertained. Oh, and I learned how to say "vote", "president", and "war" in the Main language. Woohoo!

Before we got to our destination, I asked his surname. He told me it was Feng, so I called him Mr. Feng and told him that he was an excellent teacher. He seemed pretty delighted by that. :-) I'll tell ya, there's nothing like being able to express yourself in a place where it's so easy to miscommunicate all the time.

One small step in a taxi, one huge leap for language learning!