Lindsey attending a wedding with her friends, Christine and Sara!
Monday, September 16, 2013
To speak or not to speak, that is the question. Although, I do feel like I have made tons of progress in my French speaking abilities, I feel like right now I am at the point that I know enough French to make promises, but not enough French to know what I’m promising! I’m afraid I am going to start getting myself into trouble. Well not really trouble, but I think you will start to understand my dilemma.
I had just purchased a bulk amount of tomato paste (seriously we basically use it in everything we cook). It’s one of our few staples here. Well, I went shopping with a friend, and asked if she needed any tomato paste, she said she would like to share a carton with me. I said no problem we can share a carton; I didn’t buy any because I had some. When we got back to our house, she came by with ½ a carton of tomato paste. Well come to find out, she had also just purchased some and wanted to share the cost of her carton with me! Guess what, I had already promised that I would. Now I have a carton and a ½ of tomato paste (75 cans).
Not much later, my friend was riding to town with us, and a couple of weeks prior, we had just attended a wedding together. In the car ride, she asked what I was doing that day. I told her I was meeting our other friend Christine. She started to tell me something about the wedding, and Christine. She talked about clothes, money and something else about being a Christian. She said I will give you that (for Christine) and you can give me money. I recognized a lot of words, but I just couldn’t understand everything she was telling me. Did that stop be from agreeing? Did I learn from my previous communication problem? No of course not! Instead of saying I’m sorry Sara I just don’t understand. I said, no problem! I will take care of it.
Oh what did I just do? At the wedding, Sara was talking to Christine. She said that she had some fabric for sale. It’s a really popular fabric that if you wear it everyone will know that you are a Christian. However, it’s really just not pretty (in my opinion). Come to find out, Christine didn’t want to buy it. But in the car I told her I would take it to Christine, and bring back money! Oh, how embarrassing to come back and tell her, I didn’t want to buy it, and neither did Christine.
Oh when will I learn to ask for help if I don’t understand something? Seriously, I know I need to keep practicing, but I also need to admit when I just don’t understand. It’s ok to not know. It’s ok to ask for help. But Lindsey, please stop promising people things when you don’t know what you are saying! Who knows, I may have already promised everyone in Gemena I will buy him or her food, I wouldn’t know that I promised it, but it’s possible!
Pray for my pride. I have to remember there is always a learning curve for everything. And it’s also quite normal to not be good at everything all the time, and its fine to ask for help!