the cultural misunderstanding of cuban coffee.
When i was in my 20's, my best friend and I decided to move to New York. We had gone to college in Washington D.C. and had lived there a few years after graduation. Bridget is from Ohio and, as she jokingly cites, in our circle of friends, she was the first "real" American friend many of us had ever had. In the beginning of our relationship, we had many "meetings" about miscommunications. LOL. This was the beginning of my bicultural training and bicultural identity soul searching.
I had grown up in New York - Yonkers specifically - and as my best friend, it was my duty and honor to offer her to stay at my family home. At this point, I saw Bridget as an extension of my family, and Bridget had known me long enough to "get my family." However, in my deep regard for Bridget's cultural sensitivity, I forgot that there were things I still had to explain to her. She in fact was NOT Cuban by osmosis - and I soon would find that out.
The first month we lived with my family, things ran pretty smoothly. While us grandkids would get annoyed at my grandmother's constant harassment about our eating habits, Bridget didn't mind . In fact, I think she kinda liked answering my grandmother's ten calls per day inquiring about whether we - the grandkids - had eaten. In fact, Bridget soon found discovered that by praising my grandmother's cooking, food would magically appear the next day on the stove top. Bridget LOVED empanadas, and i think for that month she managed to consume empanadas nearly every day.
Around this time, I had secured a job in The City, and Bridget was in interviewing process. As a result, she began spending many hours during the day with my family without my supervision. Again, I did think twice about this. Bridget had lived with me long enough, I thought, to have a basic foundation in Cuban customs and culture.
One day, Bridget had secured a job interview with a PR agency in Manhattan that seemed promising. I told her to call me to let me know how it went. Around three o'clock I received an ecstatic call from her. In fact, I have never heard sound so excited and passionate. She was talking literally 100 words per minute.
At first, I went along with it, thinking that maybe the energy of The City had gotten her. However, when the following words came out of her mouth - "ohh dude, i don't feel so good. I think I need to take a nap - and her words-per-minute ratio dropped to that of a turtle I knew something was wrong. The conversation that followed was something like this:
Bridget, are you okay? - Sandy
I think so, I don't know why I am so tired all of a sudden. I was soo fully of energy during the interview. - Bridget
Did you eat anything today that might have upset you - Sandy
I just had a sandwich and some coffee your grandmother had made before I came down to Manhattan for the interview - Bridget
I'm sorry, what? How much of that coffee did you have - Sandy
"I just had like two cups. I don't think thats it. - Sandy
"Bridget listen to my carefully, did you have two American cups or two Cuban cups? - Sandy
"What the hell are you talking about? I just had two cups of coffee. - Bridget
"You mean, in normal coffee cups - Sandy
"Of course. What is wrong with you - Bridget
"HOLY MOTHER OF GOD!! Bridget. Thats CUBAN coffee. You drink it like expresso. You have it in like doll-size cups. You've had the equivalent of like 15 expressos. - Sandy
"Ohh my God, that explains why your grandmother looked at me kinda weird when I went downstairs from a second cup. She said something, but I didn't really understand her." - Bridget
Needless to say, Bridget literally crashed when you completed the torturous road back home, and slept for about fifteen hours. She also secured the job, which she took. Apparently, the interviewer liked how energetic and passionate she was about the job. To this day, I'm not sure that I have ever seen her touch Cuban coffee again.
The moral of the story is - as a bicultural person there are many things that seem like common sense, but in fact are not. When you invite people to interact with your family, make sure you keep an eye on them, for their own personal well being. Your family could inadvertently end up killing them.
When I was in my early 20's, my best friend and I decided to move to New York. We had gone to college in Washington D.C. and decided we wanted to experience the beat and hussle of NYC.
Bridget is from Ohio and, as she jokingly states, in our circle of friends she was the first "real" American friend many of us had ever had. We still fondly remember many of the emergency "meetings" we had about severe miscommunications that could have ended really badly. In fact, my relationship with Bridget was, in many ways, the beginning of the intense, bicultural, identity-searching adventure I had in college.
I had grown up in New York - Yonkers specifically - and as my best friend, it was my duty and honor to offer her my family home. At this point, I saw Bridget as my sister, and she had known me long enough to "get my family." However, in my deep appreciation for Bridget's cultural sensitivity, I forgot that there were things I still had to explain to her. She was NOT, in fact, Cuban by osmosis and, at that time, had not had enough exposure to understand that words such as "coffee" did not mean the same to all people - even if they were spoken in English.
Tuesday, 28 June 2011 02:18 |
