Gaillo
21st January 2011, 01:13 AM
Henny and I drove to the city today, to trade FRN's for tangible goods.
Fascinating trip... I was VERY dissappointed with prices on most of the things we typically make these trips to buy (although we got a slight break on merc dimes, which pretty much made it all worth it). Other than the silver, I'd say we spent approx. 15-20% more for what we brought home than we did last month... inflation is flaring up - no doubt!
The most interesting event of our trip was lunch... we (as usual) dined at a cheap-ass mexican place. We were sitting next to a pair of Mexican women with about 5 children between the two of them, both mothers in their early 20's, and both chattering and blabbing on-and-on as only young women can. The interesting thing about this particular "overheard" conversation? The two were CONSTANTLY switching back and forth between (rather fluent) English and their native Spanish, often switching languages mid-sentence! Because I speak a good bit of Spanish, I was able to follow most of the conversation when I was not talking with Henny. They were mostly talking BS... Boyfriends, work, Facebook, their brothers, etc. - but the MOST INTRIGUING part of it all was that when they interrupted their "conversation" every third or fourth sentence to scold/reprimand/discipline their young children, they ALWAYS raised their voices and used SPANISH as the operative language.
Draw your own conclusions... I took away from it the sense that they think English is a short-term inconvenience - they both knew WITHOUT QUESTION which language would "last" in the long run.
Fascinating trip... I was VERY dissappointed with prices on most of the things we typically make these trips to buy (although we got a slight break on merc dimes, which pretty much made it all worth it). Other than the silver, I'd say we spent approx. 15-20% more for what we brought home than we did last month... inflation is flaring up - no doubt!
The most interesting event of our trip was lunch... we (as usual) dined at a cheap-ass mexican place. We were sitting next to a pair of Mexican women with about 5 children between the two of them, both mothers in their early 20's, and both chattering and blabbing on-and-on as only young women can. The interesting thing about this particular "overheard" conversation? The two were CONSTANTLY switching back and forth between (rather fluent) English and their native Spanish, often switching languages mid-sentence! Because I speak a good bit of Spanish, I was able to follow most of the conversation when I was not talking with Henny. They were mostly talking BS... Boyfriends, work, Facebook, their brothers, etc. - but the MOST INTRIGUING part of it all was that when they interrupted their "conversation" every third or fourth sentence to scold/reprimand/discipline their young children, they ALWAYS raised their voices and used SPANISH as the operative language.
Draw your own conclusions... I took away from it the sense that they think English is a short-term inconvenience - they both knew WITHOUT QUESTION which language would "last" in the long run.