Yesterday when I was riding the Skytrain
[ Home ]Yesterday when I was riding the Skytrain, some Chinese-speaking old ladies noticed that I had not only a heavy shopping bag on my back but also a shopping trolley, because I had just bought a lot of things at Costco. One of them remarked (in Chinese) that it was incredible or hard or that sort of thing to bring such heavy stuff to the train because the station had no "dianti" (elevator or escalator). I'm sure theydidn't expect that I understood, but because I did understand, I tried to tell them that the station actually has two entrances: the lower one has only stairs, but the upper one has an elevator. But I had forgotten that in Chinese "dianti" can mean either elevator or escalator. I thought it only meant escalator, even though it actually more often means elevator! So I turned into the world's most awkward mime, my hands gripping at an invisible box, my mouth making an "oooh" that didn't even sound like an elevator, as I tried to communicate 'elevator".
Her: Elevator?
Me: No, not an elevator (here I waved my hands diagonally, because I was still thinking it meant escalator), an elevator! I forget how to say it!
In the end, they still discovered the most important information, which is that the station does indeed have an elevator, and Costco also has an elevator by its front door, so one can very happily carry home one's heavy shopping on the train. ٩(˃̶͈̀௰˂̶͈́)و
Only after getting off the train did I remember I had a dictionary on my phone.
Just shoot me directly into an effing sunspot.