Hello?

SHOUT OUT: HAPPY BIRTHDAY ADAM!!!

And now, on to the rest of the post:

Answering the phone here terrifies me. This is in part because people in Nicaragua answer the phone by saying “Alo,” or “Hello” with a Spanish accent. So, imagine me trying to imitate a Nicaraguan trying to imitate someone from the U.S. Thoughts running thru my head include—Are they going to think I’m mocking them? What else can I say? Should I just say hello in my regular voice? Ahhhh? Then, on top of that, I must take a message for the center if it’s not someone calling for me. So—if someone doesn’t understand my “Quien es?” I and the center are screwed. Thus my hesitation for picking up the phone,

Tonight Gabi and Ana (two people who work at AKF that are 2 of my new BFF’s :)) are going to a club for Ladies Night, or Noche de las Damas. So, they keep calling here like every 5 minutes, Gabi in Spanish and Ana in 80 percent English to be like, “You know Gabi is coming to pick you up right?” “You know Ana is going to meet us there right?” So, it’s basically them saying, “We are going to come pick you up, entendiste (you understand)? Repeatedly. And I’m like yes, but then I’m like, Wait, what if I’m not getting it and I’m supposed to be getting in a cab at this very moment and going to who knows where? So then I say, Uno vez, mas (One more time) and they repeat even slower if humanly possible, ask for my confirmation again, and hang up gingerly. The moral of this story is that I am conquering my fear of answering this phone and it will hopefully pay off with lots of free drinks at Noche de las Damas, entendiste? Adios! 