Dumb ol' American

ANZed


If I haven't mentioned it before, I will now. Sometimes living in another country just makes me feel like a Dumb ol' American. I am likely to actually be considered a Dumb ol' American by a lot of people, maybe even some Americans (I know it's hard to imagine - I'm so cool and all). Anyway, things that make me feel stupid? Well, let's see. The metric system. The metric system makes me feel stupid. I know, I know, it's just numbers. But when I start to get all confused (often), I just get flustered (understandable) and I throw the tape measure (or my shoe) at the nearest Australian (or non-metric-challenged individual)and scream "I give up".

The fact that I still find it hard to understand people who are speaking English, that makes me feel stupid. But they talk so fast. And I have this whole hearing issue when there is background noise (no really, it's not just an excuse). I constantly find myself saying things like "I'm Sorry?", "Excuse Me?", "Come Again?". That makes me feel stupid.

The fact that I have no idea what some of their words mean when I do hear what they say, that makes me feel stupid. Like when they tell kids to use their "Textas" (markers) or when that guy needed me to get him a pen and he called it something else (never actually figured out what) and he finally had to use sign language.

Or like when I live her for 9 months, always telling (probably hundreds of) people "You know, right down the street from the ANZ bank." Or "Across from the ANZ". Only to be corrected by my husband one day that it's actually the AN-Zed. They call Z zed here, as do most English speaking countries other than the US (gotta love Wikipedia), and I, being confident of and secure in my alphabet knowledge, was too dimwitted to realize it - FOR 9 MONTHS! That makes me feel stupid.

How embarassing.