Some of the strangest things are proving to be the most trying to me in Tunis. Simple tasks made more difficult by my lack of language skills.
We are staying in the biggest tourist center in Tunisia. We are staying at a high end hotel. Many of the personnel are bi- or tri-lingual. I've not had any trouble getting my point across in the lobby or the restaurant. But when I pick up the phone...
All bets are off...
You know how, when you misdial--like not putting a '1' before a long distance number, or not putting the area code with a local number where ten digit dialing is required--you get a phone company recording with the message that tells you what you did wrong? The nice lady says, 'you need to dial a one with this number', or she says 'an area code is required'.
They have that lady here, too. The Nice Arab Lady with the great phone voice that tells you what you've done wrong and how to do it right so that your call can go through. Only I don't have any Arabic. So, sometimes I just listen to the Nice Arab Lady and try to imagine what I could have done wrong.
Honestly, I don't think I have successfully made a single call on the hotel phone. I walked down to the lobby to get them to explain to me how to get an outside line. I've tried several local numbers and all I hear is the Nice Arab Lady. She never gets angry or emphatic. She's always calm and rational.
Unlike me.
I wish I could figure out what I'm doing wrong. The only calls I've successfully made are people who have called my Tunisian cell phone FIRST. Then I can save their digits and call them back. Any number I enter trying to call them first... no joy. And I can't figure out what I'm doing wrong. I just hear the Nice Arab Lady again.
Maybe I'll just limit the amount of time I spend on the phone. Yeah, that's the ticket.
--Sandee Wagner
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2 comments:
I used to call the kiddo in Italy and sometimes get the nice Italian lady. He told me that usually, it was an "all the circuits are busy, try again" sort of message.
Who'd've thought dialing a phone could be so difficult?
Marilyn,
It's amazing the amount of information passed verbally by the helpful people. It could be 'all circuits are busy' or 'dial one...' or any number of things. At this point, my theory is that by the time I have enough of the language to understand the Nice Lady, I'll be sent some place else to live. spw
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