Making Friends

Well, this has been a week full of all kinds of experiences. But the ones I want to share with you deal with us making new friends in our city and apartment building.

I'll start with Mark's story. . . . .

We visited with a friend at a hardware store on Thursday to practice our new language skills (and help him with his English). A couple of his friends were there, too. Mark asked them if there was a place they would recommend to us for rug shopping. They told us there was a store right around the corner, and one of the men walked us to the store. We went in, met one of the "sales reps" and began to look at rugs. We found a couple that we liked but we realized that we forgot to bring a pillow from our furniture to match it to. Mark tried countless times to tell them that we needed to go home to get our pillow to match the colors, but they kept showing us more rugs thinking that we wanted to see beige colors. The word Mark was using for pillow was close in sound to the word beige, so they just thought we were saying, in English, that we wanted to see beige. Finally, after seeing several different rugs and trying to explain about the pillow, Mark told them that our money was at home. (That was something we had learned to say in language class during the previous class!) They understood that and told us they would be waiting for us. We came home, got the pillow AND some cash since we told them we left our money at home. When we took the pillow into the store, they understood what we were trying to do and were so helpful!! They showed us even more rugs!!! We found the perfect match and ordered two of them. They only had one like that in the shop, so they told us the factory would deliver it to the store on Friday. Mark was told to come back and ride with them to our apartment. Well, after they delivered it to our apartment, we decided that we liked the bigger size the best, and Mark headed back to the store. This time, while waiting to deliver the rug, the "sales rep" took Mark to lunch. On the way to the restaurant he walked with Mark arm in arm, waving to ALL of his friends, and telling them about Mark, his new friend. Of course, he doesn't speak English! The really cool thing about this is that by the time Mark's new friend went back to his rug shop, he referred to Mark as his brother. That is probably one of the highest compliments to be given by a local friend. So now Mark has the freedom to go back anytime he wants to this rug shop just to visit and have tea. How cool is that?!

OK - so on to my (Melissa's) story . . . also on Friday. I have only met one of our apartment building neighbors during the month we've been here, so I decided that this would be the week to get out and meet some women. There is a lady upstairs from us that speaks English, whom we've spoken with briefly a time or two. I thought that would be a great place to start. (I even made banana bread to share!) I went again on Fri. and she wasn't home again. Well, I remembered one of Mark's friends downtown telling us about a family on the same floor as us that he and his wife are good friends with. I decided to guess which apartment would be the right one. I stood between two doors for a brief moment listening for noise in each apartment, thinking that it would help me firgure out who was home. I heard noise in both apartments, so I made a aplit second decision to knock on door number 2. The lady of the house opened the door, took my banana bread, gave me a pair of slippers to put on (about a size too small), and ushered me into the salon within a matter of seconds, it seemed. All the while, she was rattling off all sorts of words I didn't understand. There were two other women in the salon, and she introduced me and (I think) told them that I'm the new person in apartment number 1. My hostess asked me if I wanted water, tea, or coffee. I asked for coffee, which was delivered to me with a placte full of food!! While she was bringing coffee and food to me, more women started arriving, and one of the women in the salon when I arrived called her daughter, who speaks English very well, to welcome me and explain why all the other women were coming. Unknown to me, this group of friends was having their bi-weekly gathering for socializing. So here I was with a plate full of food, the only one in the room (10 women at this point) with food! And the only one who doesn't speak the native language!! I finished my food about the time the table was set and all the food was spread out for all the other women to enjoy. I think I drank 2 or 3 more cups of tea, but I couldn't eat another bite! I enjoyed listening to the conversation, and occasionally I could pick up some word or phrase. Then they all started giving money to one of the women. I had heard about what they were doing, but before I could try to explain that I understood the same lady with the English-speaking daughter called her daughter and had her explain it to me. When they meet twice a month, each person gives a set amount of money to the lady hosting it. It comes from a tradition that was meant to help women save money to buy something special. I stayed a total of 2 hours, but for this introvert, it seemed like an eternity!!! I was invited to the next gathering in 2 weeks. The problem is that I don't know where any of these women live! Thankfully, I also got a couple of phone numbers, including the English-speaking daughter, so I'll find my way.

We are so excited about these new friends!! Maybe soon we'll be able to have some real conversations in their language.

If you haven't made a new friend in a long time, look for opportunities to meet someone new this week. You never know what kind of adventure it will lead to!!!