02 October 2008

¿Dónde esta el baño?

Okay, so most of you all know that I speak fluent "Dora" Spanish. I have also retained quite a bit of high school Spanish, but drop me off in a Latin country and I would only be able to find the bathroom and stinky green cheese. Keep this in mind.

Any way, I am the 2nd Councilor of the Stake Primary Presidency and I am required to attend a few meetings, some of which are meetings about meetings. One of said meetings was last week. It had been a long day and I dreaded leaving the clutches of my 6 mo. old. It would also require that I apply make-up and a dress, both of which require the use of heavy machinery.

So I put in a real effort, kiss my ninos adios, and head to the meeting. The meeting lasts a mere 90 minutes or so and was chased with refreshments. Not bad...except that the whole meeting was in SPANISH!

Now for those of you that roam the earth and check into church in whatever language, knowing that the spirit will be the same, you at least have the heads up that you are going into a situation that requires a different ear. It is like watching Evita for the first time thinking that you are going to see an action movie about the revolutionary Argentina only to find out it is a craptastic OPERA! You keep watching to find out when the cast is going to drop the bravado and just speak, but they never do. It is a little traumatic.

So I sat through this meeting, it is late (it started at 8:30pm) and all I can understand so far is a word that I would swear was ice cream (helado). We had been prepped that we each might need to say a thing or two as well and I was wondering the whole time if they would get the spirit of what I was saying (some say that I convey more with my hands and eyebrows than all the words in the world). Luckily the meeting ran long and we did not all have to do our part. But in the future I will be a lot more sympathetic to those people with glazed eyes in meetings. Maybe we just aren't speaking their language and hopefully they will get the spirit of the message.

3 comments:

...for all eternity said...

Good for you for staying. I think I would have found an excuss like, "oh there's ice cream in the kitchen?!" and gotten outta there!
Our ward in CT had a spanish translater. They would sit in the back of the chapel and speak into a microphone that broadcasted it on a closed circuit to those wearing a receiver and headphones. We had to give him a copy of our talks. It was kind of neat. Those same members would often bear their testimonies and you could feel their love of the Savior.

I'm with you on the whole Evita situation. You are descibing EXACTLY what happened to me when I saw it! A little heads-up would have been nice!

Stacey said...

You are so brave. "Dora Spanish" Love it!! As long as I'm speaking to a little girl with a purple pet monkey where boots who's happened to be named Boots AND there is a talking, hiccupping blue bull named Benny, then I think I'd be okay.

I'm so sorry you had to live through that. Why on earth you'd you have had to go to that meeting? Nobody new it was in Spanish? You're my hero! I'd rather deal with bad jam lady than that.

~Stacey

Broncop3t3 said...

¡Bien hecho hermana! No hay muchas personas quienes irían a una reunión así y quedarse.