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Casa Blanca

Sun., October 15, 2006

I like those second-person pronouns you can use when speaking with a friend or on friendly terms with a stranger. These you-substitutes in the Midwest tended towards “man,” as in “Hey, man; how’s it goin’?,“ or “guys“ in plural, even if the addressees weren’t male (“You guys going to the concert tonight?”).

Bodega and deli counterjoeckeys here in New York have mastered this turn of phrase. The guy at the bodega on the corner of my street calls me “sir.” The Indian guy at the snack shop in the lobby of my work building calls me “boss” and a popular alternate along these lines is “chief.”

I got my first non-English pronoun lobbed at me today while Halloween-costume thrifting at the Goodwill on 181st off Amsterdam. Approaching a blue-vested woman working the second floor, I pointed to what I thought were the changing rooms and asked if I could try on the two pairs of natty slacks I had draped over my arm. “That’s storage, papi,” she said. “Changing rooms are downstairs.”

Papi! I’d overheard that one in my neighborhood before, along with mami, but never had it applied to me, so I felt honored. It’s used by Spanish-speakers in America to refer not only to family members but as a general reference to anyone, regardless of age or familial status.

After my usual tall-man-in-a-small-dressing-room antics, the cashier downstairs rang up the pair of pants and two ties I’d selected and started, “Nueve ochenta...” before glancing up and realizing I didn’t appear to be someone who spoke Spanish.

“Sorry...Nine dollars and eighty-five cents.”

“No problem,” I said. “If I’m going to live here, maybe I should learn to speak Spanish.”

“It’s a beautiful and difficult language,” the girl admitted.

One of her colleagues standing nearby said, “It’s a backwards language. You know what I mean, right?”

The other girl stared at her.

“You know what I mean. Say something in Spanish.”

The countergirl thought for a second and said, “She is stupid. Ella es estúpido.”

The other girl narrowed her eyes and said, “No, you know: backwards.”

I slipped away from this strange argument and only after I’d left and walked five blocks did the phrase casa blanca pop into my head. I realized by “backwards” the girl probably meant how nouns in Spanish precede adjectives.

Tags: Streets of New York | Comments have been closed.

On October 17, 2006 at 8:39 p.m., Andie wrote:

are the pants for you halloween costume? are you going to tell me in advance who you are coming as or will it be a surprise?

On October 17, 2006 at 8:41 p.m., Jimi Sweet wrote:

I like how I'm addressed as "friend" when shopping on Ninth Avenue. "Papi" usually infers that the speaker finds you sexually attractive. I mean, hello, she called you "daddy." She totally wanted you.

On October 20, 2006 at 4:03 p.m., Joe wrote:

I know what he is coming as :)