Being Foreign and Its Perils

I'm not talking about last night when I was taunted twice while walking down George Street. Once by a group of first years; another was a morbidly obese a man with weight issues  (it's crossed out so I'm not an insensitive bastard) who tried to taunt by flailing his arms to my face but then stumbled on his own feet. poor guy.

Ah I'll leave those interesting stories to another blogpost :( though these don't faze me as much as it used to anyways.

What I am talking about is something less trivial, more of something that happened during my consult:

"Doctor, I've been having these stomach pains."

"Can you tell me more about them?"

"Well, it's okay now since my wife just gave me the quickies."

the what?  Floating above this 72 year old man was an image so horrifying that I wanted to clean, bleach and disinfect my eyes twenty times before I gouge them out. Okay, maybe it wasn't that bad. but the moment of awkward silence and the WTF expression sprawled across my face was enough to prove my point.

Being foreign sucks.

I knew this would happen sometime along my timeline. Partly because I managed to graduate high school with an "omg social convention yuck" mentality, followed by another four years of hiding behind my closest friends. Tugging their sleeves like a 5 year old whenever social protocol dictates.

But now the past is back to haunt me, mostly because I didn't know three simple things:

1. quickies is actually quick-ease

2. quick-ease is an over-the-counter antacid

3. i knew 1 and 2 after i prescribed him more antacids. 

IF ONLY I HAD KNOWN?!

If only.

What's to say if one person tells me that they "choked on a blowie" or "touched a cockie". Awkward turtles leave me be!! You'd think that for a moment that after 15 years of English, the level is substantial to rid of any tongue-tie or misunderstanding. But no, I'm swimming in a vat of deep shit. 

Very deep.