I got a call today for my extended car warranty. I’ve started answering all scam/telemarketing calls the same way because their reactions make me giggle. As soon as they pick up, I very enthusiastically say:

Me: “HELLO! We’ve been trying to reach you about your extended car warranty! How are you today?!”

I think I threw the chick for a loop because she stuttered and went:

Caller: “My extended car warranty?”

I heard someone in the background speak.

Caller’s Coworker: “Oh, it’s her. Just hang up.”

Then, there was a click and the phone went dead. I died laughing!

I am a Scottish woman, and I’m spending a university summer working as a counsellor at a very ethnically diverse summer camp aimed at low-income, inner-city teenage girls.

Me: “Come on, girls, everyone queue up for lunch.”

I notice a few surprised looks but don’t think anything of it. I continue calling groups of campers “girls” for the next few days, until I am called into a meeting with my boss and other senior staff members.

Boss: “I don’t know how to say this, but you have to stop calling the kids ‘ghettos’.”

Me: “Sorry, what?”

Boss: “This is serious. I don’t know why you think it’s acceptable, but it has to stop.”

Me: “I don’t call them ghettos. I call them girls.”

Boss: “Wait, what?”

It turns out that the rolled Scottish R is very similar to the soft D sound a lot of Americans make instead of a double T. So, my very Scottish accented “gehr-lls” sounded to an American ear a lot like “ghettos”. It took some persuading to convince the senior staff that I wasn’t being offensive; I was just Scottish!

I explained what happened to the teenagers, who found the misunderstanding hilarious, but I only called them “kids” or “ladies” for the rest of the summer.

One of my older cousins got married when I was in my early teens. Some of the bridal shower decorations were made with pearly pale pink beads. There were a few packs of beads leftover, so I used some of them to make a short necklace for my cousin. It didn’t look too different from any other inexpensive faux pearl necklace.

A few weeks later, she brought up the subject of the necklace.

Cousin: “It really is beautiful. Thank you.”

Me: “You’re welcome!”

Cousin: “You know the best part?”

Me: “What?”

Cousin: “I get to tell people, ‘Oh, my cousin made me a necklace for my wedding shower!’ and they assume I’m talking about a little kid. Then, I point to my neck and say, ‘Isn’t it pretty?’ and the look on their face is hilarious!”

She’s mostly stopped wearing jewelry since the birth of her first child, but I’m glad she got a few laughs out of it before it had to be hidden from grabby baby hands!

I work as a graphic designer. We do commercial printing such as business cards, postcards, and signs, and we have a variety of clients from small to large.

I’m working with a real estate agent on some signs and business cards. I create the mock-up and send the proofs by email. The client replies with some minor changes. I do those and sent the new proof.

A few days pass by, and I get a phone call from the client.

Client: “I’m inquiring about the status of my order.”

Me: “I’m still waiting for an approval on the latest proof.”

Client: “I approved by email! I’m losing money because you haven’t begun printing my order!”

Me: “I never received an approval.”

Client: “I have proof!”

She screen-captures her email and sends it to me so I can verify that she actually approved the order. I look at the screenshot that she sends.

Me: “You never hit send; the email is still a draft.”

She goes silent for a moment.

Client: “When can I have my stuff, then?”

She got her stuff a few days later.

Many, many, many moons ago, I worked for a computer security company. I did the whole gamut, went from consumer to corporate support, and experienced a veritable rainbow of interactions with callers. The one that sticks out the most in my mind was when the UK got a snowstorm and we got tapped for their support calls. (Okay, you got me. It wasn’t an inch. I think it was three. I can’t remember the exact amount, but I do recall most of my team snorting when they were told. To us, that was a mild inconvenience.)

We were supposed to treat them like regular calls but relax our prohibition on profanity. With American callers, we were supposed to hang up once someone started cussing in any form. UK folks were allowed to cuss unless it was specifically directed at the person on the call, and they got a warning first.

It honestly didn’t seem like that big a deal, and for the most part, it wasn’t. The folks from across the pond were pictures of magnanimity and did their very best to go slow for me. Around 5:00, I thought this was just going to be some fun! I knew not the linguistic adventure that was waiting for me.

As it so happens, people from the UK are time travelers, so 5:00 pm for me is 10:00 pm for them. I took my next call, and the voice on the other end of the line was a man who was clearly very upset with a side of moderately drunk, and I was utterly incapable of deciphering anything this man was hurling at me other than the profanity. The profanity came in loud and clear; the other noises this man was making sounded like what happens when an American tries to use English pronunciation on something written in Polish — lots and lots and LOTS of consonants and vowels and no meaningful information communicated.

Me: “Sir, I can’t understand you. I need you to go slow for me, please, because this is getting us nowhere. I’m trying to help. Please stop shouting.”

As it so happens, [Customer #1] wasn’t shouting. His voice went all the way up to eleven. He toned it back down once he’d made it clear that he hadn’t been shouting previously.

Ah! A brainstorm. Since HE could understand me just fine, I asked:

Me: “Is there anyone else home I can talk to who isn’t as… Welsh?”

He nearly busted a gut laughing either at my idea or my description. I took that to mean he was home alone.

That was not going to work. I was almost tempted to go with one grunt for “yes” and two for “no” before I had a second and much better brainstorm. My last call was from a person who was perfectly comprehensible, and it had only been five minutes. That guy was super nice and I’d done a good job helping him fix his problem, so maybe he’d do me a solid in return. I wasn’t sure if that was a thing I could do, so I peeked my head up over the cubicle wall to get my supervisor’s attention. I guess he was listening to my call because his face had a look of existential horror with a side of headache pain; it brightened up considerably, though, when I floated my idea and I got the go-ahead.

In a tech support call center first, I actually called back my last customer. Happily enough, [Customer #2] picked up right away and asked what was up. I explained the situation with the Welshman on the other line and asked if he might be able to help me figure out what exactly he was trying to say. The man had trouble breathing afterward from laughing so hard.

Customer #2: “I’ve been to Cardiff a time or two, and I would be delighted to help my poorer relations across the pond!”

Perfect.

I conferenced the calls and all three of us were on the line. Irate Welsh noises greeted me once I made sure nobody had gotten dropped.

Customer #1: *Angry Welsh noises*

Customer #2: “Oh, good Lord. I see why you were in a spot of bother.”

Customer #1: *Jovial Welsh noises*

Customer #2: “Not happening, mate. She’s been dead for years. Now, what’s your issue?”

Customer #1: *Long burst of profanity-laden Welsh noises*

Eventually, we got his problem sorted with a minimum of fuss and bother. Ten minutes later, we were sorted and he had an email address to reach out to if he had further trouble. (He was on dialup and a thingummy in his software corrupted because 56k dropped packets like they were singles at a strip club. He also couldn’t fix the problem whilst on the phone because 56k.)

Me: “Okay, [Customer #1]. I’m not calling a translator again if I can’t read your email.”

I got a stream of Welsh sounds in return.

I knew something was up because I didn’t get an immediate translation. All the translator guy relayed from a much longer string of noise was:

Customer #2: “He says he’ll do his best.”

There was laughter over the phone from both UK folks.

Customer #2: “No, you can’t say that to a Yank. It’s different over there.”

More Welsh noises.

Customer #2: “You can insist as much as you like, but I’m not passing it on.”

There was a Welsh annoyed grunt and then a clicking sound.

[Customer #2] rushed through goodbye noises and accepted my thanks graciously. I’m pretty sure he rushed off the phone.

I did get a gold star (a positive remark on a performance review) for overcoming a language barrier in an inventive fashion. The Welshman never emailed a follow-up, and to this DAY I occasionally wonder what could’ve possibly been THAT offensive.