silly questions...
on Tara's Ethiopian Adventure (Ethiopia), 03/Dec/2009 05:52, 34 days ago
Sometimes I feel like walking around with a big billboard on me saying‘fine, thank you... how are you?’ I reckon I am asked‘how are you?’‘are you fine?’ close to 100 X a day (and that is not including the amount of times that I am asked it in the local language). Although I think I would rarely answer‘fine’ to this question in England, (I think I am more likely to say‘good’ or‘alright’) I find if I deviate from the‘set phrase’ here they can seem annoyed or at best confused. I know they just want to practice their English with a native speaker but there are 40,000 of them in this town and only 1 of me... it gets a bit repetitive! The other billboard I am tempted to wear would say‘none of your business’. This would be in response to the other favourite question‘Where are you going?’. At first I found myself being polite and humouring them with answers but then I started thinking... hang on... I don’t actually want these strange men to know where I am going (and I am rubbish at lying)...so now I feel lost for how to respond. I don’t want to be rude but I wish they would practice their phrases on someone else so I didn’t feel obliged to answer!