We’re back…
Random Observations: Week 8
The sushi is horrible here – don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. Ok, that may not be entirely true, some of the sushi is passable here and if you only like salmon and cream cheese, you’ll probably be fine. Had we become sushi snobs from living in NYC?
Ok, so let me be completely open here – I am writing this after we stopped into a random sushi place to satisfy a sushi craving and were given a tuna roll with tuna from the can. Now, I like tuna from the can – with some mayo on a sandwich. When it is rolled up inside of some seaweed and rice, it is one of the most disgusting things you can ever have. We have pretty much decided that the next time we get a sushi craving we’re going to do everything possible to quash it. And yes, we have tried a lot of recommended places, some of which are ok, but they cannot compare to NYC sushi restaurants for freshness or variety. When we’re back in December, we’re talking about only eating sushi!
- I still can’t believe that beer is so cheap here. We had a party last week and seven 1-liter bottles were only $27 pesos! (U$9) Beer is close to being cheaper than soda.
- If you want to write “hahahaha” as if you were laughing, you actually write it as “jajajaja.” This makes sense in Spanish since “ja” is pronounced as “ha” would be in English. Still, it looks a bit weird to see it in an email the first time.
F*CK
The f-word, f-bomb, f***, @$#*%, fcuk, etc. is one of the nastier 4-letter words that one does not say in polite company. It’s also one of the most versatile words in the English language – it can be a verb, noun, adjective, interjection and more.The use of the word fuck is quite interesting here. It is not a part of the Spanish language, but you’ll see it in grafitti and even in the name of some trendy stores and hip clothing brands. The photo to the right is the new clothing store that just opened around the corner from us. It’s name would raise a lot of eyebrows and probably some protests in the U.S. but it doesn’t get any attention here (except from us foreigners).
Giving someone the middle finger seems to be a near universal gesture, and porteños (locals) call the gesture “the f*ck you” – most without even knowing what that means exactly. When watching re-runs of U.S. cable shows on standard TV, they don’t bother to bleep out the f-word as they would at home. The translation of it to Spanish in the subtitles is usually something like mierda.
While you really notice it at first, you eventually realize it’s just a word like any other, and humans are the ones who give it meaning. All right, I’m off to learn some of the 4-letter words of the Spanish language, so I can truly be conversant.
