¡Ay Perdon!

Hey, a little slice of piece for you. In memory of George Carlin and in the spirit of many stand up comedians that can laugh at themselves, here is an awkward anecdote that happened to me yesterday...

How I do love Mexican food! Well, Tex-Mex food since I have never had the luxury of eating in Southern California, Texas, or Mexico proper. One day I will, but, again, how I do love Mexican food.

But we are in Ohio*, whose main culinary export seems to be chili. Chili from Cincinnati, which is pretty much Kentucky. But chili originates in the Southwest, so there is hope for jammin' Mexican food in Ohio.

I usually make an ass out of myself at Mexican restaurants. Not in the "We are taking Grandma Esther to have her first ever taco!" awkward or "This isn't as good as Taco Bell" horrible, mind you. My horror comes from something that you would imagine actually makes the process smoother.

I am a native Spanish speaker. Puerto Rican Spanish, of course, but Spanish nonetheless. I can say jalapeño with the necessary nasal uptick of the ñ character. I don't pronounce it to rhyme with "we know" or "hero." And I can salsa with the emphasis on the first syllable, almost coming out to sound like salt and not like some big Italian guy.

I don't look like I speak Spanish. I look like I am actually from Ohio. Somewhere in the middle of the state like Wooster, OH. Sometimes I notice that the waiters are caught off guard by this. My sister, who name drops her Puerto Ricaness like a job reference. will then bust into full Spanish. This somehow makes the entire experience more authentic.

I never bust into Spanish. There is no guarantee that that waiter or waitress speaks Spanish. They could be the Mexican-American equivalent of me!

"Well, I was raised in Mexico City**, but I do sound like am from Minong, Wisconsion, don't I!? Now, do you want those margaritas on the rocks?"

Or we could begin to switch a round of "que?" since the server would speak Mexican Spanish and I have my own Spanish. I say habichuelas, he says frijoles, and everyone else says beans.

The Spanish does break out and here is where I look stupid. Like the rolling "r's" you practice in Spanish clash, the languages sometimes rolls off my tongue and into pretentious prick land.

So when Amanda and I ordered some desert and I said, Can I have some sopapillas, por favor," my immediate reaction was to crawl under the brightly colored table in the shape of a sun.

The waiter must have thought I was saying that to be smart. How many times must the servers of Mexican resturants have an "hola," or "si," or "por favor," thrown at them by people whose limits of Spanish end at those words? I was just trying to say sopapillas right, becuase, you know, that is how it is actually said! I wasn't trying to be cute or coy.

When we got out deserts, the waiter handed me the fried dough drenched in honey and chocolate with a quick "Here is your desert, señor."

Ack! A señor!? Did he play along to placate me? Like I somehow did well in my Intro to Spanish class and required gratification. Plunge a knife into my heart because I hate looking stupid in front of my favorite ethnic food.

I need to up the Wooster, OH act.

Peace!






*Of course, I am new to the state. Maybe lovely readers will educate me with famous Ohio eats.