Xander ,'Lessons'
Off-topic discussion. Wanna talk about corsets, duct tape, or physics? This is the place. Detailed discussion of any current-season TV must be whitefonted.
Maybe it has some deeper cultural meaning. Such as, if you accept a gift of oatmeal you have to marry her eldest child or you are obligated to save her and her family if there's an earthquake or flood. Or possibly she just bought too much oatmeal.
Edited because I no spell good.
Is there ever too much oatmeal?
I'm going with a definite "yes", Megan, especially as winter is over (however ugly Spring may yet choose to be)
Well, you know, if I'm going to eat plain oatmeal, I won't go the instant route.
Still, weird.
Okay, anyone got any theories about why my very nice but completely unintelligible Chinese next-door neighbor just tried to give me a box of instant oatmeal?
I'm vastly amused by the way she speaks to me so earnestly, and yet clearly has to know that I don't get a word she's saying. This must be what it is like to have American tourists in a non-English-speaking nation.
considers
I am your Chinese next-door neighour. Only less generous with my foodstuffs. And more given to profanity.
Now I am picturing Fay as the Chinese guy from Deadwood because the only colloquial English phrase he knows is "cocksucker" Well, at least, I can entertain myself after all.
Ibna Kelba.
(Arabic for son of a bitch. Which is very, very, VERY offensive indeed. Slightly less offensive is Ibna Kelb, which means son of a dog.)
Fay Jay! A cab driver said insh'allah (sp) to me yesterday and I knew what the hell he meant!
(I'd said 'have a good day' or 'hope the weather breaks' or somesuch)
Ojala in Spanish means about the same thing...one of the lasting leftovers of the Moorish influence in Spain.
Cool!
Salaam alecum (Peace be upon you) is a most excellent multipurpose Hello/Goodbye phrase to employ in such circumstances. And the Arabic word (well, at least in Egyptian Arabic) for yes is "Iowa".