While waiting at one of my favourite stalls I filmed a little so I could see how it felt doing it in public.
Answer – it felt awkward! Here I am – don’t know why my voice is so squeaky!
It will be another challenge to get comfortable doing this but I’d like to be able to film local sights and it helps if I can talk at the same time.
In the end I did my shopping in Catalan as usual as it doesn’t feel ok speaking in Castellano with people I normally talk to in Catalan. Unless I explain every time what I am doing which sometimes I do, but more often not.
So exciting that the cherries have arrived!
As I was waiting an older woman arrived at the stall and instead of asking ‘la ultima?’ she started buying her stuff although it was obvious I was there first. I really had to squash down the urge to turn away and buy things somewhere else. The guy knew it had happened and was friendly when he came to me so I commented how often this happens to foreigners, that you can end up feeling you are invisible. He listened but didn’t really reply – sometimes I wonder if it is because I haven’t explained it correctly or if it’s just that people here don’t say things like that.
Wondering if my red dress makes me stroppier? Or perhaps it’s being a year older so I am beginning to feel like the old woman who wears purple and doesn’t care. I also had my toenails painted this week which is another amazing magical way of gaining confidence
Then I went to the olive stall where the man is not very friendly – nothing personal I know as he was the same with Pep one day. After buying three bags of olives and he seemed as grumpy as ever and I couldn’t keep quiet any more. I said – in English with a smile – ‘you are very scary’. He ignored me totally but as I was just on the point of paying he couldn’t go away so I said it again then translated into Castellano and Catalan…….’tengo miedo de ti’…… ‘tinc por de tu’
All the waiting women in the queue started laughing and said – ‘yes, you are very serious today’ and he laughed too and suddenly the atmosphere was so much better
Funny how you can change things with just a few words.
I wonder if I am changing into someone who says what she thinks – in three different languages?
Warning – When I Am an Old Woman I Shall Wear Purple
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When I am an old woman, I shall wear purple
with a red hat that doesn’t go, and doesn’t suit me.
And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves
and satin candles, and say we’ve no money for butter.
I shall sit down on the pavement when I am tired
and gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells
and run my stick along the public railings
and make up for the sobriety of my youth.
I shall go out in my slippers in the rain
and pick the flowers in other people’s gardens
and learn to spit.
�
You can wear terrible shirts and grow more fat
and eat three pounds of sausages at a go
or only bread and pickles for a week
and hoard pens and pencils and beer nuts and things in boxes.
�
But now we must have clothes that keep us dry
and pay our rent and not swear in the street
and set a good example for the children.
We must have friends to dinner and read the papers.
But maybe I ought to practice a little now?
So people who know me are not too shocked and surprised
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