Removing lentils and the art of being understood
There have been many things to adapt to for me since moving from France to Australia, and this is the beginning of an attempt to explain.
Some misunderstandings at our house are epic. Most of the time, Christian knows what I’m saying – I might construct my English sentences on a French grammar model, invert the order of things, use strange expressions, but he still manages to get my drift. He corrects my inversions, or sometimes yelps for mercy with a ‘That sentence was way too long!’, and explains for the millionth time that English is about brevity (I still don’t get it).
But one time, goodness, I innocently hit the cryptic mother-load and got a full minute blank stare with matching frown – by saying the most natural thing in the world to me: ‘I need to remove my lentils because my eyes are feeling really sticky.’
What do you mean you don’t understand lentils? Those transparent things you put in your eyes to correct your vision? And they get sticky at the end of the day, so that is when you take the lentils out?
Now he knows, so he is no longer concerned about my sanity when he hears me mentioning my lentils and my eyes in the same sentence. But he still reminds me they are called ‘contacts’ in English from time to time. I think he has disturbing mental images of me mushing legumes onto my eyeballs he’s not telling me about.
(Puy lentils – my favourite – from here)
4 comments