when i was a little kid, i didn’t care for movies. my parents always admonished me for sitting too close to the screen or fidgeting too much, so i turned to books instead. when i was four, i tried to watch the first harry potter movie. i absolutely loved it, but it wasn’t enough for me. i had to get my hands on that book. the teachers at pre-school said it was a horrible idea, but i read the first two books anyway.
then came kindergarten. the teachers scolded my parents for letting me bring novels to school. “she can’t possibly understand them,” they said. so they gave me tests on the books. i made perfect scores on all of them. i preferred books to movies and television; movies didn’t do justice to the stories i loved.
so, they marked me down as a “gifted child.” they tested my IQ and everything. i was the perfect student, in their eyes. i sat in the front and listened to the teachers as intently as i could.
one day after school, i ran up to my mother and hugged her. then, i turned my head and saw my mother walking towards me. i looked up at the woman i had hugged. “you’re not my mother,” i said, astutely.
my mother, a clever woman, thought to have my eyesight tested. turns out, i had horrible vision. somewhere around 20/450. functionally blind without glasses. not ideal for anyone, especially a six year old.
all my life until that point, people thought i must be some sort of brilliant prodigy, eschewing television and movies for more intellectual pursuits, but actually i just couldn’t fucking see lol
This took a different direction than I was expecting.
Person A: You know… the thing Person B: The “thing”? Person A: Yeah, the thing with the little-! *mutters under their breath* Como es que se llama esa mierda… THE FISHING ROD
As someone with multiple bilingual friends where English is not the first language, may I present to you a list of actual incidents I have witnessed:
Forgot a word in Spanish, while speaking Spanish to me, but remembered it in English. Became weirdly quiet as they seemed to lose their entire sense of identity.
Used a literal translation of a Russian idiomatic expression while speaking English. He actually does this quite regularly, because he somehow genuinely forgets which idioms belong to which language. It usually takes a minute of everyone staring at him in confused silence before he says “….Ah….. that must be a Russian one then….”
Had to count backwards for something. Could not count backwards in English. Counted backwards in French under her breath until she got to the number she needed, and then translated it into English.
Meant to inform her (French) parents that bread in America is baked with a lot of preservatives. Her brain was still halfway in English Mode so she used the word “préservatifes.” Ended up shocking her parents with the knowledge that apparently, bread in America is full of condoms.
Defined a slang term for me……. with another slang term. In the same language. Which I do not speak.
Was talking to both me and his mother in English when his mother had to revert to Russian to ask him a question about a word. He said “I don’t know” and turned to me and asked “Is there an English equivalent for Нумизматический?” and it took him a solid minute to realize there was no way I would be able to answer that. Meanwhile his mom quietly chuckled behind his back.
Said an expression in English but with Spanish grammar, which turned “How stressful!” into “What stressing!”
Bilingual characters are great but if you’re going to use a linguistic blunder, you have to really understand what they actually blunder over. And it’s usually 10x funnier than “Ooops it’s hard to switch back.”
If you think sphynx cats are ugly you’re a coward. A sphynx cat is a cat with all the extraneous detail whittled away to pure, concentrated cat. The very essence and soul of cat.
Plus it’s the closest you can get to owning a real life gargoyle
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