The reason why the German woman knowing Bengali felt like a such a contrast to last week. Do you relate to it too?
So in my yesterday's post I shared how i talked with this expat woman from Germany in this new Cafe in St Marks Road of our city Bangalore in India who is working here. She engaged well but the thing which made me surprised is that when I said I am originally from West Bengal state of India, she said she also knew a bit of Bengali and she isn't an Indian-German but a Caucasian German woman so fully a foreigner who knows the language. I asked her to say some Bengali words and she said "Ami Bangla Jani" which means "I know Bengali". I asked her how she learned and she said a few years ago she was in the city Kolkata for a volunteering thing and learned it. I am 25 and she is also about 27-32 age range mostly but yeah her knowing Bengali feels like such a contrast from last week.
That's not because of any rejection last week but because I remember last week Thursday, near Trinity area of our city, I initiated conversation with this African woman. At first she greeted back but when I said that I am just saying Hi to new people and trying to socialize, she was talking in some completely different foreign language which I didn't understand at all. I tried to talk in simpler English but she still kept talking in that language so I politely asked her to speak in English as she kept saying something which I couldn't understand and then she kept repeating the word "Swahili". So that's when I came to know she was speaking in Swahili language as I heard about the language on the internet and that it's spoken in some African countries. I said "Oh so it's Swahili?" And she nodded yes. As I didn't understand her language at all, I eventually ended the interaction saying Okay have a great day and she also greeted back to show goodbye.
That was so interesting tho to talk to someone who spoke a completely different language. But yeah the contrast i meant was how last week I met a foreigner who spoke a completely different language with me and yesterday i met another foreigner who literally knew my native language (Bengali) little bit and that shows how in Bangalore too anything is possible haha. I never expected a German to know my language just like how I never expected an African to speak Swahili with me which I don't understand at all haha.
That's not because of any rejection last week but because I remember last week Thursday, near Trinity area of our city, I initiated conversation with this African woman. At first she greeted back but when I said that I am just saying Hi to new people and trying to socialize, she was talking in some completely different foreign language which I didn't understand at all. I tried to talk in simpler English but she still kept talking in that language so I politely asked her to speak in English as she kept saying something which I couldn't understand and then she kept repeating the word "Swahili". So that's when I came to know she was speaking in Swahili language as I heard about the language on the internet and that it's spoken in some African countries. I said "Oh so it's Swahili?" And she nodded yes. As I didn't understand her language at all, I eventually ended the interaction saying Okay have a great day and she also greeted back to show goodbye.
That was so interesting tho to talk to someone who spoke a completely different language. But yeah the contrast i meant was how last week I met a foreigner who spoke a completely different language with me and yesterday i met another foreigner who literally knew my native language (Bengali) little bit and that shows how in Bangalore too anything is possible haha. I never expected a German to know my language just like how I never expected an African to speak Swahili with me which I don't understand at all haha.
22-25, M