Witty Surprises from Multilingual People That Left Others Speechless

31. All is Good

When I was teaching kids in Japan, I would only respond with “English only” to their Japanese, I did this for a few reasons:

1. To make them think I didn’t speak Japanese.

2. To make them use English more.

3. So I could scare the crap out of them once I decided to speak Japanese.

Some kid in an English school didn’t do his homework, when I asked him for it, he told me in English that he “forgot” his book. He then turns to his classmate and says in Japanese that his book is in his bag and he didn’t do his homework because he couldn’t be bothered. I said nothing.

Come to the end of the class, his mother is waiting in the reception, along with my Japanese manager, so I tell the manager in English that he didn’t do his homework, I hear the conversation between the kid and his mom – with him giving the same “forgot” bullsh*t.

So, I just say in perfect Japanese “Why are you saying you forgot the book? When I asked you in the class, you told the other student that it’s in your bag and you didn’t do the homework, because you couldn’t be bothered. I’m sorry, didn’t you know that I could understand Japanese?”

Mom opens the bag, finds the book, smacks the kid on the head with the book and tells him to sit in the reception doing his homework. Kid cries. All is good.

32. Shocked and Embarrassed

One time my best friend and I were people-watching at the mall, and we randomly started rating the men around us. In sign language, of course. There was this one dude sitting near us and we start rating his looks and his body. I said that he looked like he had a nice butt and that his eyes were really beautiful, with the color of the deep ocean. so I rated him a 10/10. Then he came over to us and then told us in sign language: “Thanks for the compliments, ladies. you really made my day, haha.” We were both so shocked and embarrassed.

33. Concerning the Rude Woman

A lady on the bus was being a b*tch and slagging people off in Greek until she got to me. She was being excessively nasty about my chipped nail varnish, I don’t know either maybe she was having a bad day. As soon as I clocked it I turned around and looked her dead in the eye with my very Greek face and she stopped. She then sat in the seat in front of me where I sat and called my mom, also Greek, who I had a conversation with for the duration of the bus journey about the rude lady who slagged my nails off because she thought I couldn’t understand, in Greek. It was delicious.

34. The Look of Horror

My grandmother, who grew up in a Yiddish-speaking household, but does not look particularly Jewish, lives in an area near a large Hasidic community. She has many stories of people saying all sorts of things in Yiddish assuming that she can’t understand but I have one particular favorite.

She was in the supermarket and a little Hasidic boy of about 3 or 4 is wandering around, clearly lost. He sort of nuzzles up against her skirt and says “Mama mama,” in Yiddish. She replies in Yiddish that she’s not his mom but he can come with her and they’ll find her together. The little kid looks up at her with a look of horror and runs away screaming “Mama Mama! The shikse speaks Yiddish!”

35. Don’t need it From Strangers

Went to a taco shop with my SO; the kind that has half the menu in Spanish, and the other half in English. Only two people there spoke English. SO is Hispanic, but doesn’t speak Spanish. I’m Jewish, but I studied Spanish for 5yrs, and am quite fluent.

We order to-go and are sitting and waiting for our food. We’re right by the kitchen, so I can hear what people are saying in there. My ears perk up when I hear “gringa” (I’m the only white woman in there), so I, of course, start listening.

At full speaking volume, I hear these two ladies talking about how a nice Mexican boy doesn’t need to be dating “a skinny white b*tch”, and how it’s embarrassing that we’re together. Now, at this point, we’ve been waiting on our food for about 25min. I see one of the ladies walking out, so I go ask her, in Spanish, if our to-go order would be ready soon.

If she had a tail, it would’ve been tucked between her legs. She very quietly said “I’ll go check” while not daring to make eye contact. I’ve never seen someone get too sheepish.

The kicker? They messed up our order. I went back and told them that maybe if they spent less time talking about their customers, and focused more on their orders, I wouldn’t have had to wait so long for my food to be wrong; all in Spanish. Petty? Maybe. Still felt good. I get enough crap about being a mixed-race couple from my own family, I don’t need it from strangers.

36. Uncle’s Jaw Hit the Floor

My uncle has a good one. My family are originally from India/Pakistan and speaks Urdu, but my mom’s family moved to rural Arkansas in the late 70s. It was a really small town, like never seen brown people small, but they ended up living there for over 20 years.

Anyway, when my uncle was in high school, they had a math teacher from Japan. One day the teacher was berating my uncle for something (in English of course) and my uncle got mad and cursed him out in Urdu. The teacher replied very calmly, in Urdu: “don’t ever use that sort of language in my class again, understand?” Pretty sure my uncle’s jaw hit the floor. He didn’t expect a Japanese guy living in a small town in Arkansas to speak Urdu.

37. It’s the Hair

Well, I’m an African-American guy in Tennessee with a big afro and a deep voice. That being said, I’ve been teaching myself, Russian, for the past few years. I’m not fluent yet, but I’m getting better. My boxing coach of 4 years was Russian and spoke it to me often enough.

So, I work at a small wine and spirits store downtown in my city. Because of the location, most tourists who stay at the local Sheraton and Marriott come visit us because we are so close. Elvis week some time ago brings in people from all over so we always get tourists. These two Russian guys come in looking for not vodka. I show them the Talisker Storm and they decide to take a look around for a while. I poured them some wine samples we had out as well and reassured them I’d help them find whatever they wanted. As they were walking around they were saying in Russian how nice the store was and how nice I was. The taller one even complimented my hair lol. They brought up the Talisker to the counter and I gave them a discount. The taller guy asked why and I responded in Russian “Because you like my hair”. They both turned super red and started laughing saying I’m awesome. Then we went by the growler station and they started telling me about Russia while we drank Ghost River. Good times.

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38. A Delightful Experience

39. In an Effort to Profit

40. The Convenience Fee Vanished Overnight

My mom is half Filipino and half Chinese, and we lived in Hong Kong for most of my childhood before we came to North America, so we’re all fluent in Cantonese. One day, my mom was trying to send money to relatives back in Asia through Western Union. The teller at the desk was a portly Chinese man. My mother had an argument with the man because he was trying to charge her some arbitrary “convenience fee” of $10 that she has never been charged for before. They fight over it for a while in English, going back and forth. Eventually, another employee comes, and asks the teller my mom was arguing with “What’s going on?” In Cantonese. The teller proceeds to say “this stupid b*tch refuses to pay me, I can’t get her chubby *ss out of here”. At this point my mom is livid. She takes a deep breath and calmly answers “well maybe I’d leave if you let me send money to my family, and stop charging me extra so you can buy lunch for YOUR chubby *ss.” Both employee’s cheeks turn red and suddenly become extremely nice, grovelling and praising my mom’s fluency in Cantonese and nervously laughing and repeating “we didn’t know you were Chinese!” over and over. The convenience fee suddenly disappeared.