Pretending not to speak English.

Okay, this is the most embarrassing and unrelatable story I am going to post on this forum.

I live in a rental home with my mom and my brother and our shower was broken. My mom called to get the shower fixed and the maintenance guy said he would come the next day. My mom is the director at a daycare and since I am above the age limit (12), I can't go to work with her. So I forgot that the maintenance guy was coming that day, and I was laying on my couch with boxers and a T-Shirt on. The guy rang the doorbell and I swear, I was not in control of my body. I shot up and hid everything that could be evidence that could hint that someone is in the house and ran into my room. I shut the door quietly and went into my closet. Since the guy had keys to the house, he opened the door and said "Hello? Maintenance," and I was SHAKING. I was in the closet for at least an hour. I was getting really hungry because I hadn't eaten breakfast, and I thought I could get away with going to the kitchen and getting some goldfish crackers because he was downstairs. I had forgotten that you could hear everything that was going on upstairs and the guy RAN up the stairs. I was frozen in fear, I couldn't move. Luckily, I turned around just in time. He walked into the kitchen and I was soooo scared, so I just used my natural instinct and ignored him. My plan was to pretend I was deaf (coincidentally, I wear hearing aids) and waited until he used physical force to get my attention. He tapped my shoulder and I turned around scared. I did random hand movements to pretend I was using ASL. Then, I made a muffled "I'm deaf" and made it sound like I haven't ever heard myself speak in my life. Omg, I was so scared and felt so guilty afterwards. XD. He didn't bother me afterwards.
 
no I haven't, but I'm pretty sure it's happened to me while traveling, especially in Japan & Italy - everyone there supposedly didn't know any English
 
p e p p e r said:
no I haven't, but I'm pretty sure it's happened to me while traveling, especially in Japan & Italy - everyone there supposedly didn't know any English
Click to expand...

Well if they are like me and my compatriotes, they are more likely understanding what you are saying, perhaps missing some words because of the accent but the problem is they are not confortable enough to speak English, because they live in a country where they don't need it and are not used to speak it. For instance, I don't speak English, I can read it, I can write it (not that well), I can understand it depending on the person, once a tourist asked me about pizza but pronounced peesseh or something that didn't sound like I'm used to hear, so I never got what he meant, but I can't speak it, I just have no idea how to prononce some words, "TH" words are just evil and my mind is not quick enough to form sentences without saying "uh hm uh hm" at each words. So I would think that most of people mind just go blank when they are asked to speak English out of nowhere.
It's possible that they really don't know any English either, in my family and relatives the majority don't know any English at all.

- - - Post Merge - - -

visibleghost said:
what would you do if they replied to you in japanese tho.....
Click to expand...

Haha! That reminds me of when my BF was pretending just to understand English and two French girls were trying to BS him and his friends and at the end, he just started talking French and the girls looked like they wanted to hide in a hole. XD

Where I worked, most of my co-workers could talk several languages (English, French, Italian, Spanish, Arab, Chinese)
but pretended they couldn't, so that way they could hear what the customers were saying between them and then adjust their sale speech.
 
Yes, I speak French fluently, so it's pretty gr8. Even though Canada's other national language is French, barely any people know it.

Once, we were camping, and these kids wouldn't stop shouting at me, so I tried ignoring, but they wouldn't shut up. So I turn to them, and say "Vous parlez a moi?" The two kids stopped dead in their speech and didn't say another word to me. It was amazing :p
 
Ok, so once when I was on Gaia (i think was like 12 or 13) I decided to be a Lil **** and sat on someone else's car. They walked up to me and said "Hello, why are you on my car?" Me knowing like 2 spanish phrahes I said "no hablo ingles" to which the user typed to his friend next to him "oh she speaks spanish" his friend typed "dont worry, i speak spanish" and he typed son long message.....so I logged out



I hate myself when i was that age
 
I wouldn't pretend to not be able to speak English around the police. :p

But I've never done it, nor have I ever even thought about it honestly.
 
painchri589 said:
Yes, I speak French fluently, so it's pretty gr8. Even though Canada's other national language is French, barely any people know it.

Once, we were camping, and these kids wouldn't stop shouting at me, so I tried ignoring, but they wouldn't shut up. So I turn to them, and say "Vous parlez a moi?" The two kids stopped dead in their speech and didn't say another word to me. It was amazing :p
Click to expand...

Yeah it depends where in Canada :p Once my aunt and cousin were shopping in Alberta and were speaking French to each other when the clerk asked if they needed help, my aunt barely knows English so tried to speak with her hands instead, the clerk who thought they weren't understanding anything made fun of them in English, said she knew some French but had not intention to speak that ****ty language and added some more insults with a big smile...then my cousin who is perfectly bilingual asked her in English if she could see her manager. XD
 
I don't know another language, but I've always wanted to do this. I have severe social anxiety and honestly, when people approach me, I want to cry, and I barely even have the ability to process language fast enough to respond anyways.
 
I'm very fluent in Italian and Spanish.
Sometimes when I'm in public I would always be in a situation with a group of girls who would "envy" me or try to throw shade with sly remarks. Ones that you know it's about you but they do it indirectly.

I would call up a friend and I'll speak loudly in native tongue thus makes them think I don't know English. Then I'll switch back to English but I'll say it brokenly or random, words that relates to them(girl, big, it's stinky in here, etc) then I'll go back to my native tongue.

Does a Bajan accent counts as pretending to not speak English? It like broken English and I talk like that all the time.
 
I've not done this but one time I was with a friend and he did and it was soooo awkward ; v ; I'd say I'm way more annoyed when people assume I don't speak English or are impressed by my English because I'm Asian. I'm like I've lived in the US all of my life :mad: it's a little racist
 
Lol, i just had a dream where i did this in school after doing soemthing bad, i spoke 2 languzges, and to the teachers i wasn't replying back in English, and then they got hella lenient with me . Then i went to some office thingy and some japanese lady was there and she said, japanese customers here, so i went and started explaining it to her in like perfect japanese. Cuz why not i was bored. Im having so many trilingual dreams lately.
 
Last edited:
i just use arabic in times of dire need because thats the only other language i know perfectly (other than english)

story time: when i came back from iraq and we got in the line for us citizens at the airport, this lady was like US CITIZENS ONLY and like she was looking at us and pulled my mom out of the line and told her it was only for us citizens and my mom showed her our american passports and that shut her up good
 
what...ive never been in a situation that needed me to. what kind of teacher wouldnt know if her student spoke english or not ?? and why would u lie to the police lmao
who opens the door for salespeople when theyre not expecting visitors?? also who answers calls that are random numbers, just wait 4 a voicemail or answer and hang up immediately if u dont know the person? idk whyd you have to pretend not to speak english ever
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

Poka
Trading Villager Freya/Luppa to give
Replies
0
Views
15
Poka
Poka
Tude
Any of y'all native German speakers? 🇩🇪
Replies
10
Views
290
-Raven-
-Raven-
SkyKnight03
Do you have a common name? How do you feel about it?
2
Replies
35
Views
787
Muna
Muna
Crystall
NEW to Collecting and need A LOT of cards :-) Any help appreciated
Replies
2
Views
213
Tiffastar09
Tiffastar09
VernalLapin
Niche hobbies you have/had.
Replies
10
Views
249
SkyKnight03
SkyKnight03
Back
Top