A long time ago, in another life, I worked in the
construction industry. I was pretty good at pretending, so it took a number of
years before anyone figured out that I had no idea what I was doing, and I was
forced to become a humor writer instead.
At some point along the way, I worked with a guy named Ivan.
As you can imagine from the name, he was Chinese... wait, no, Russian. He was
Russian. He and his cousin had moved to the United States from Russia (or maybe
one of the ‘ias, or the ‘stans – I don’t remember exactly) when they were in
their early twenties. He was (and I am hoping, still is) a fun and enthusiastic
guy, a hard worker, and an interesting fellow to talk to.
I had a lot of great conversations with him about his move
to America and settling in. When he arrived he was most amazed about the amount
of choices for everything at the grocery stores. He said in Russia you could
usually find what you needed, but there would only be one brand of each thing. No
wonder he moved. That’s just no way to live.
Fortunately, we have a lot of Russian immigrants, so he had
an American-style selection of Russian ladies to choose from when it came to
dating, and he was married with kids when I met him.
One day at the job site he was on the phone discussing his
wife’s birthday present - with his black market hedgehog dealer, obviously. Because
it had simply never occurred to me to own a hedgehog, I had no idea they were
illegal to keep as pets in California. Apparently, the way he told it, every
person from Russia loves hedgehogs, so it was going to be the ultimate gift for
his wife.
I’m not one hundred percent sure what would happen if I gave
my wife an illegal hedgehog for her birthday, but I’m certain she would have a
less-than-Russian reaction. She might even report me to Fish and Game, or whomever
is in charge of trying to thwart illegal hedgehog smuggling. No telling.
He had some good stories, but none better than the one about
his first trip to Walmart.
He and his cousin had just arrived in the U.S., and wanted
to gear up to go fishing. They were looking to purchase waders. (For those of
you from New York and LA, waders are rubber overalls with attached boots, sort
of like a prophylactic for your whole body. Instead of standing on the bank of
the river not catching any fish, you can wade out into the water up to your
chest and still not catch any fish, but you’ll be dry, like you were on the
bank.)
Ivan and his cousin spoke almost no English at this point,
and they were at the sporting goods section of a Walmart, which did not carry
waders. This was before the internet (yes, kids, there was a time before the
internet when we all had to talk to each other – dark times indeed), so with
severely limited English, the two Russian twenty-something males were
attempting to ask the female Walmart clerk where to go to buy waders.
That’s all well and good, and might have turned out fine,
but the problem was that between the two of them, the only English
fishing-related word they knew was ‘hook.’
They did not know the word ‘waders,’ nor did they know ‘boots,’
or anything else that might have described the uniquely-purposed item they were
trying to source. All they knew was the word ‘clothes.’
So here are our heroes, both pantomiming the writhing,
thrashing, yanking, and pulling required to actually get a pair of fishing
waders on and pulled up to your chest, occasionally throwing in a whipping
motion to simulate casting a fly rod, all the while repeating the same phrase
they have expertly assembled in English to get their point across to the female
clerk.
“We need hooker clothes.”
She called the police.
When the police department’s Russian interpreter peeled
himself off the floor after his fit of hysterical laughter, he explained the
misunderstanding to both parties, and everyone had a good chuckle. No charges
were filed.
Learn the language, kids. (Or always have the internet
handy.)
See you soon,
-Smidge
Copyright © 2017 Marc Schmatjen
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