I'm in a South American country, where the language is Spanish (with a twist) and I don't speak it. But, dammit. I was doing pretty OK until now. I've managed to order in restaurants, complain that the bill wasn't right, get my room key fixed a couple of times and all in Spanish. Really bad, phrasebook Spanish but there nonetheless. However, I just tried to get room service (I'm tired and I just don't want to go out in the cold night) and I tried in Spanish, but couldn't be understood. Nor did I understand what she was saying. At all. I asked (in Spanish) if she spoke/understood English and she didn't even understand that, or I didn't understand her reply. I had to put the phone down.
So imagine it, you're tired, a bit cold, a bit hungry, been in a country for a week where you really don't understand much of what's being said around you and can't put more than a couple of sentences together and actually be understood (and the chances are that the response is going to be less than totally simple at which point you haven't a clue what's going on) which is quite stressful and the stress really builds up after a while and makes you more tired. Then that happens. (oh and your room is on the 11th floor and only one of the three lifts goes as far as that floor and it has a mind of its own, you can wait for up to 10 minutes for it to come to the 11th - for some reason it likes to sit on 6th)
I'll just have that bottle of fizzy grapefruit I bought earlier and go to bed. I can eat in the morning.
