Friday, April 30, 2010

Lost in translation

One good thing about living in Sri Lanka is that most people speak some degree of English, except the guards here at the apartment. We had a frustrating incident when we ordered Pizza Hut delivery. I called down and told them to let them up, the guard calls me and tells me they are in the lobby, so I told them to send them up, minute goes by the guard calls again, I tell him to send him up. Finally I go for the door ready to go down only to see the elevator door open and the Pizza Hut guy walking my way, shaking his head and chuckling about the guards.

Fast forward to tonight, we thought we would do the home delivery thing again. This time Chris calls down to tell the guards to let them up, she gets off the phone and she was pretty frustrated.
She said the guard didn't speak any English.

I decide to go down to both guard tables and tell them to let the delivery guy up. This turned into a pretty frustrating experience to the point I just buried my face in my hands and went back to the apartment.

I have zero confidence that these guys would be of any assistance in an emergency.

Brings back memories of the compound guards in Saudi, but they were much worse.