Stranger in a Strange land

I was headed the great white north of Seattle this afternoon to fix some friends dinner. They live way out in the hither lands where they got a lovely blanket of snow last night. We, in the Tropics of Wallingford only got rain. Any-who...On my way, I headed to the Viet Wah for groceries, I was making Phad Thai and Tom Yum Goong. I wanted some sour shrimp paste. Doesn't it just sound yummy? Went to a young fellow and asked, "Do you speak English?" I was totally ignored. It was as though I did not exist at all. I often feel that way in Asian markets in Seattle. I didn't ever feel that way in Thailand though. People were always eager to help. Give me advise, and mention my massive height, hairy legs and or oversized nose. This was all before they realized that I could actually speak Thai.

Back at Viet Wah, having gotten a nowhere with English, I thought I would just give it a try, and asked, in Thai, "Do you speak Thai?" He suddenly became animated and said, "Yes!" But he didn't look Thai to me. He wasn't. He was Vietnamese. He just happened to have lived in Thailand for 6 years. We had a nice chat and he lead me right to the spiciest shrimp paste this side of Kruntep.