Asshole Chinese Customer Doesn’t Realize The Cashier Can Understand Chinese
Never judge a book by its cover. This wise old saying applies in many situations, but particularly so when it comes to language. This story, uploaded onto the Tumblr page ‘Fuck-Customers‘ is a perfect illustration of that.
Written by a cashier, who identifies herself as a ‘white caucasian female,’ the tale is a warning to anyone who thinks it’s OK to trash talk someone in a foreign language. An impatient couple, who the cashier identified as Chinese, were coming through her line, with the wife making snide remarks at the cashier in Mandarin. She had probably made the calculations in her head, the chances of a white girl, working as a cashier, being able to understand this famously difficult language must be incredibly slim. However, today wasn’t to be her lucky day. Scroll down below to check out how it unfolded for yourself, and let us know what you think in the comments!
This story about a rude customer trash talking a cashier in Mandarin is a good example of why you should never judge a book by its cover
Image credits: David Woo (not the actual photo)
Here’s what people had to say about the story
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Share on FacebookA similar thing happened with my wife in London. She is Asian AND very fluent in Italian. We were in the tube and were about to get off, when we realized that a family was just standing at the door, blocking the way. As it happens way too often, the family was Italian. We kindly asked them to let us pass but they just pretended we didn't exist. So we pushed our way out and the father said something like "you can ask instead of pushing, damn you" in Italian. My wife turned around and yelled at his face "and you can move your a*s out of the way!" in perfect Italian. The shock on his face. I couldn't stop laughing. Not because of the situation, but the face of the guy. Priceless. Note that rude foreigner thinking that nobody understands them is quite common. I've seen my fair share of french tourists saying very rude things, thinking that nobody understood...
My American father started teaching me German when I was a toddler. My whole life, he has stressed to me that we should never say anything in front of someone in a foreign language that we wouldn't say in their native tongue. As a college student heavily involved with international student organizations, I preached this to my international peers.
I had a college friend that spent a year in Japan. She was on the train, previously having a really bad day, and was talking in english how she was done with Japan and she wanted to go home. The gentleman who had been sitting behind her, gets up to depart, leans over, and says in English "It's really not that bad here." Fast forward a year later and she's in New York. She hears two women behind her talking in Japanese. She understands every word as they say how horrible and stupid Americans are and that New York was a filthy city. As she left the bus, she turned to them and said in Japanese "It's really not as bad as you say it is." The jaws on those women dang near hit the floor in horror of realizing she understood every word.
I'm a Chinese and I've got one thing to say.Please don't feel like most of us are the same.She is just coincidentally both disgusting and being a Chinese.There is no connection between manners and races.
May this be a lesson to you, dont be an a*****e even if you think you cant be heard
Agreed, how about we just don't trash talk people, period?
Load More Replies...just sayin' that is the most stupid expression. There was no need for that comment either. What sort of job should they have then? Translator? Possibly too many of them. Don't be a job snob. Take what you can get at times.
You're right, Chris. Do people think interpreter jobs are a dime a dozen? Most companies outsource for interpreter needs because they don't want to pay salary and benefits for one person who "only speaks all day." They prefer to use the child coming with the parent, the patient in the other bed or the janitor rather than wait or page the interpreter who abides by a code of ethics and confidentiality. Story of my life. I was a professional interpreter for a large hospital and had to convince the staff to actually use my services rather than inappropriately rely on whoever was at hand.
Load More Replies...*ascending applause* this is amazing!! I love how the cashier didn't just say, "Shut up dude, I know what you're saying" but instead did it in a way that really embarrassed the Chinese girl. The Chinese girl totally deserved that!!
"skilled enough to be bilingual and still stuck as a cashier"... Maybe they've grown up with two languages, maybe it's a hobby, maybe they studied is. Doesn't miraculously give you other skills you might need for another type of job.
I have a Masters degree in education, speak two languages, have studied several more, and have a part-time job as a cashier to supplement my income as a teacher.
Load More Replies...I'm multilingual. I have had so much fun at other people's expense because it never occurs to them that I can understand what they're saying.
I had a similar situation in that my sister and I look like we could be twins, even though we are 4 years apart in age. We just happened to be working at the same shop and would often have fun messing with the customers. Like the guy that says "Remember when I talked to you about this yesterday?" I said "No." He says "Yeah..we talked about it for a few minutes yesterday!" I said "That would have been impossible. Yesterday was my day off." Then the confused customer sees my sister walk around the corner, does a double take and says "Well maybe it was her I talked to yesterday..." Yep..probably was..LOL.
Load More Replies...You wouldn't believe how many americans think that nobody else on this planet speaks english. Trash talking in a language anyone who went to school can understand.
i worked in a job that had me dealing with some not-so-nice people from all ethnicities & walks of life. while we had a few different languages spoken, it was mostly english & spanish, so i learned some conversational spanish, mostly for emergency situations. i kept it under wraps unless absolutely needed, in the beginning. here i am, a middle-aged, southern white woman (complete with the southern accent) who only spoke english as far as everyone knew...until one day i walked into a room with a group of spanish speaking males. at first they got quiet, even though they were speaking their native tongue, but then decided to tell each other a few things they'd like to do to me. that was the day i decided to let them know that i understood what they were saying. you should've seen the looks on their faces when i told them "Yo escuche y comprende..." along with 'you should be ashamed of yourselves!' (havent used spanish in many years, so i forgot how to say that). word got out quickly!
We, spanish people, are white too, I don't understand those saying the opposite
A) Some folks are ignorant B) In the US, when people hear someone identify as "Spanish," they think of someone from the Americas who's a native Spanish speaker, not a European from the country of Spain! and C) In the Americas, Spanish speaking people are ethnically diverse. Some have a large amount of indigenous (Pre-European) ancestry, some are descended from the African slaves of the transatlantic slave trade, some are descended from European colonists and later immigrants.
Load More Replies...How about the commenters that are judging her for being a cashier? They apparently know a lot about her just from this story.
As someone who can speak five languages fluently (Romanian, English, French, Italian and German) and enough to ask his way to the bathroom in other two (Spanish and Russian) I frequently bump into people who speak their own language without realising they're being understood... Thankfully negative experiences have been few and far between, but it does happen to find someone trash-talking you in their own language. Of course, most times however, it's completely innocuous and in some cases I actually helped them, for example I got a group of five very lost Italians to their hotel, gave a couple of Germans an impromptu tour of Bucharest because I had nothing better to do that day, and I love playing the tour guide etc.
Before my former bosses realised my actual level of English, I got plenty of useful information as they would go around carelessly speaking about me and some of my coworkers. I accidentally uncovered my skills when they heard me speaking with a client. From then on, it was all whispering, lol.
And lots more of these stories can be found on Not Always Right.
My kids took French in school and when they wanted to talk freely between themselves when their mom or I were in the room, they would pretend to be practicing their French. Then parents get divorced, Dad (me) marries again and they try this trick again. My new wife starts talking to them in French and the look of horror on their faces was priceless! In reality my wife only knows a tiny bit of French, just enough to play this trick and it worked!
I speak Russian & Ukrainian, English and Arabic! No one can ever guess where Im from or what I speak. I use this power all the time! :) Spanish is my next plan!
I've had this experience in Hong Kong being called gweilo & Japan being referred to as gaijin (uncivilized, dirty, barbaric, uncultured white person). When they find out you know what those terms mean they try to convince you they're not offensive terms. Obviously they are...
Language learning can take 400-2200 hours. Useful insights about hardest language to learn - https://www.justlearn.com/blog/hardest-languages-to-learn It is definitely difficult to learn a new language like Chinese.
:D the only language I am remotely fluent in other than English is Spanish (used to be fluent but didn't use it so kind of rusty, not to mention learn first latin america Spanish then Spain Spanish... the two dialects can get you confused) but my husband is fluent in Russian (his first language thought he was born in Egypt) Arabic (his second language) and English. Now some people say he looks Arabic and Other say he looks Russian so it's always funny when people are surprised when they speak Arabic or Russian and my husband understands them. the few times this has come into play the people were saying insulting things about me and my husband put them in their place.
Something similar happen to me but in reverse, I was picking up a pizza at our local pizza joint that was owned by Greeks. I had ordered a pizza with extra cheese, when they handed the box to me one of the workers says in Greek it doesn't have extra cheese, the woman who owned the place said in Greek, nevermind just sell it to her. I'm half Greek and don't look Greek at all being that my Father is British. I said to them in English that's okay as long as I'm not paying for the extra cheese. They froze and the woman laughed saying oh you speak Greek? I said yes I do in Greek and handed her the money, never bought another thing from them after that.
I met a cute American guy living in Singapore, who was fluent in Malay. He told me once how some local girls were flirting with him and scheming about how to steal his expensive looking watch. After a while, he pipes up in Malay, that "they should not bother. The watch is just a cheap copy." The girls just about s**t a brick!
what is wrong with being a cashier at least she has a job i was a cashier it takes a special person to put up with stuck up people who think they are better than you just because you are a cashier it's better than unemployment it doesn't mean you are stupid or below anyone else
Basically, do not bad mouth someone unless you want them to know what you are saying.
Funny I bet it happens more then not. Although. Im not buying the part about the husband.
I can totally relate. I was born and grew up in Poland, unlucky enough to have olive complexion and almost black hair. You could honestly mistake me with an Indian woman. I also have a "significant" birthmark on my forehead, so I guess many people assume I am one. Not to brag, I'm quite good at languages, and as I speak English without a trace of the Polish accent, I get random foreigners, e.g. asking me for directions, as they are sure they just met someone from the West. It is always funny (still a little annoying) to hear the legendary - Your English is very nice... as for a Polish girl - when they happen to find out that I'm actually 100% Polish.
I had a colleague once, a Vietnamese orphan, adopted by Bremerhaven fish traders, the ones with a car on the local market and a really strong frisian accent. She studied arabic and economy. And my, that girl could really curse in Arabic. That was a very fine ladette breaking all clichees. :)
"Ladette"? How's about "woman"? Is that what you meam?
Load More Replies...Language learning can take 500-2200 hours. Useful insights about hard languages to learn - https://www.justlearn.com/blog/hardest-languages-to-learn It can be so difficult to learn a new language like Chinese.
The odds were not in that customer's favor that day. Nagging curtailed effectively for about 10 minutes.
As a white person denigrated by people who didn't know I understood Spanish, I feel your pain.
You never know who's standing in front of you. Remember that story (I think in Paris) with the guys who wanted to steal photo gear from a karate guy, just because he looked senior? Well , the Chinese couple was lucky!! I learned this lesson the hard way, with kind of a nice, well hearted grandpa, who was in fact a Mob guy. I was lucky to be left without something broken.
No saying what the customer did was acceptable BUT do you have to have the word Chinese in the title when the story has nothing to do we race?
Someone I used to know was complaining in Russian about a dark-skinned man on a bus before her (not because of his race). He turns around with a smile and responds in perfect Russian.
I didn't mean to press send yet xD I have a much nicer one: I'm Russian and I speak Spanish with our local Mexican florist and he speaks Russian to me. Great guy.
Load More Replies...i was on a flight in the US and there was an asian guy sitting next to my boyfriend and I. All of a sudden I found out I forgot something that I left on another flight and started cursing my a*s off in Dutch (as I am Dutch) I wasnt shouting but just belting out every nasty word I could imagine for five minutes straight. At the end of the flight our Asian neighbour asked my boyfriend "are you two Dutch? I lived in Amsterdam for a few years" Aaaaahhh!!! at least I didnt say anything nasty about HIM.
I speak 3 languages and have had similar situations multiple times with each language xD
I used to work at a bar as a waitress, and this gorgeous girl from Russia that spoke perfect English worked there too as a second job. She amused me one night when I asked her a question about something. She shook her head a bit, like she was rattling her brain, and said, "sorry, I'm trying to translate that in my head. I've been working all day as a translator." At some such Russian government thing. She was so cute shaking her head like one of those bobble head dolls.
I would probably just greet them in Mandarin. Make them comfortable to talk in their mother language
What if they were American and did not speak mandarin?
Load More Replies...I’m a big fan of recycling myself, but you just ran this bit 4-6 months ago, no?
No, I certainly didn't see it. This is the first time.
Load More Replies...A similar thing happened with my wife in London. She is Asian AND very fluent in Italian. We were in the tube and were about to get off, when we realized that a family was just standing at the door, blocking the way. As it happens way too often, the family was Italian. We kindly asked them to let us pass but they just pretended we didn't exist. So we pushed our way out and the father said something like "you can ask instead of pushing, damn you" in Italian. My wife turned around and yelled at his face "and you can move your a*s out of the way!" in perfect Italian. The shock on his face. I couldn't stop laughing. Not because of the situation, but the face of the guy. Priceless. Note that rude foreigner thinking that nobody understands them is quite common. I've seen my fair share of french tourists saying very rude things, thinking that nobody understood...
My American father started teaching me German when I was a toddler. My whole life, he has stressed to me that we should never say anything in front of someone in a foreign language that we wouldn't say in their native tongue. As a college student heavily involved with international student organizations, I preached this to my international peers.
I had a college friend that spent a year in Japan. She was on the train, previously having a really bad day, and was talking in english how she was done with Japan and she wanted to go home. The gentleman who had been sitting behind her, gets up to depart, leans over, and says in English "It's really not that bad here." Fast forward a year later and she's in New York. She hears two women behind her talking in Japanese. She understands every word as they say how horrible and stupid Americans are and that New York was a filthy city. As she left the bus, she turned to them and said in Japanese "It's really not as bad as you say it is." The jaws on those women dang near hit the floor in horror of realizing she understood every word.
I'm a Chinese and I've got one thing to say.Please don't feel like most of us are the same.She is just coincidentally both disgusting and being a Chinese.There is no connection between manners and races.
May this be a lesson to you, dont be an a*****e even if you think you cant be heard
Agreed, how about we just don't trash talk people, period?
Load More Replies...just sayin' that is the most stupid expression. There was no need for that comment either. What sort of job should they have then? Translator? Possibly too many of them. Don't be a job snob. Take what you can get at times.
You're right, Chris. Do people think interpreter jobs are a dime a dozen? Most companies outsource for interpreter needs because they don't want to pay salary and benefits for one person who "only speaks all day." They prefer to use the child coming with the parent, the patient in the other bed or the janitor rather than wait or page the interpreter who abides by a code of ethics and confidentiality. Story of my life. I was a professional interpreter for a large hospital and had to convince the staff to actually use my services rather than inappropriately rely on whoever was at hand.
Load More Replies...*ascending applause* this is amazing!! I love how the cashier didn't just say, "Shut up dude, I know what you're saying" but instead did it in a way that really embarrassed the Chinese girl. The Chinese girl totally deserved that!!
"skilled enough to be bilingual and still stuck as a cashier"... Maybe they've grown up with two languages, maybe it's a hobby, maybe they studied is. Doesn't miraculously give you other skills you might need for another type of job.
I have a Masters degree in education, speak two languages, have studied several more, and have a part-time job as a cashier to supplement my income as a teacher.
Load More Replies...I'm multilingual. I have had so much fun at other people's expense because it never occurs to them that I can understand what they're saying.
I had a similar situation in that my sister and I look like we could be twins, even though we are 4 years apart in age. We just happened to be working at the same shop and would often have fun messing with the customers. Like the guy that says "Remember when I talked to you about this yesterday?" I said "No." He says "Yeah..we talked about it for a few minutes yesterday!" I said "That would have been impossible. Yesterday was my day off." Then the confused customer sees my sister walk around the corner, does a double take and says "Well maybe it was her I talked to yesterday..." Yep..probably was..LOL.
Load More Replies...You wouldn't believe how many americans think that nobody else on this planet speaks english. Trash talking in a language anyone who went to school can understand.
i worked in a job that had me dealing with some not-so-nice people from all ethnicities & walks of life. while we had a few different languages spoken, it was mostly english & spanish, so i learned some conversational spanish, mostly for emergency situations. i kept it under wraps unless absolutely needed, in the beginning. here i am, a middle-aged, southern white woman (complete with the southern accent) who only spoke english as far as everyone knew...until one day i walked into a room with a group of spanish speaking males. at first they got quiet, even though they were speaking their native tongue, but then decided to tell each other a few things they'd like to do to me. that was the day i decided to let them know that i understood what they were saying. you should've seen the looks on their faces when i told them "Yo escuche y comprende..." along with 'you should be ashamed of yourselves!' (havent used spanish in many years, so i forgot how to say that). word got out quickly!
We, spanish people, are white too, I don't understand those saying the opposite
A) Some folks are ignorant B) In the US, when people hear someone identify as "Spanish," they think of someone from the Americas who's a native Spanish speaker, not a European from the country of Spain! and C) In the Americas, Spanish speaking people are ethnically diverse. Some have a large amount of indigenous (Pre-European) ancestry, some are descended from the African slaves of the transatlantic slave trade, some are descended from European colonists and later immigrants.
Load More Replies...How about the commenters that are judging her for being a cashier? They apparently know a lot about her just from this story.
As someone who can speak five languages fluently (Romanian, English, French, Italian and German) and enough to ask his way to the bathroom in other two (Spanish and Russian) I frequently bump into people who speak their own language without realising they're being understood... Thankfully negative experiences have been few and far between, but it does happen to find someone trash-talking you in their own language. Of course, most times however, it's completely innocuous and in some cases I actually helped them, for example I got a group of five very lost Italians to their hotel, gave a couple of Germans an impromptu tour of Bucharest because I had nothing better to do that day, and I love playing the tour guide etc.
Before my former bosses realised my actual level of English, I got plenty of useful information as they would go around carelessly speaking about me and some of my coworkers. I accidentally uncovered my skills when they heard me speaking with a client. From then on, it was all whispering, lol.
And lots more of these stories can be found on Not Always Right.
My kids took French in school and when they wanted to talk freely between themselves when their mom or I were in the room, they would pretend to be practicing their French. Then parents get divorced, Dad (me) marries again and they try this trick again. My new wife starts talking to them in French and the look of horror on their faces was priceless! In reality my wife only knows a tiny bit of French, just enough to play this trick and it worked!
I speak Russian & Ukrainian, English and Arabic! No one can ever guess where Im from or what I speak. I use this power all the time! :) Spanish is my next plan!
I've had this experience in Hong Kong being called gweilo & Japan being referred to as gaijin (uncivilized, dirty, barbaric, uncultured white person). When they find out you know what those terms mean they try to convince you they're not offensive terms. Obviously they are...
Language learning can take 400-2200 hours. Useful insights about hardest language to learn - https://www.justlearn.com/blog/hardest-languages-to-learn It is definitely difficult to learn a new language like Chinese.
:D the only language I am remotely fluent in other than English is Spanish (used to be fluent but didn't use it so kind of rusty, not to mention learn first latin america Spanish then Spain Spanish... the two dialects can get you confused) but my husband is fluent in Russian (his first language thought he was born in Egypt) Arabic (his second language) and English. Now some people say he looks Arabic and Other say he looks Russian so it's always funny when people are surprised when they speak Arabic or Russian and my husband understands them. the few times this has come into play the people were saying insulting things about me and my husband put them in their place.
Something similar happen to me but in reverse, I was picking up a pizza at our local pizza joint that was owned by Greeks. I had ordered a pizza with extra cheese, when they handed the box to me one of the workers says in Greek it doesn't have extra cheese, the woman who owned the place said in Greek, nevermind just sell it to her. I'm half Greek and don't look Greek at all being that my Father is British. I said to them in English that's okay as long as I'm not paying for the extra cheese. They froze and the woman laughed saying oh you speak Greek? I said yes I do in Greek and handed her the money, never bought another thing from them after that.
I met a cute American guy living in Singapore, who was fluent in Malay. He told me once how some local girls were flirting with him and scheming about how to steal his expensive looking watch. After a while, he pipes up in Malay, that "they should not bother. The watch is just a cheap copy." The girls just about s**t a brick!
what is wrong with being a cashier at least she has a job i was a cashier it takes a special person to put up with stuck up people who think they are better than you just because you are a cashier it's better than unemployment it doesn't mean you are stupid or below anyone else
Basically, do not bad mouth someone unless you want them to know what you are saying.
Funny I bet it happens more then not. Although. Im not buying the part about the husband.
I can totally relate. I was born and grew up in Poland, unlucky enough to have olive complexion and almost black hair. You could honestly mistake me with an Indian woman. I also have a "significant" birthmark on my forehead, so I guess many people assume I am one. Not to brag, I'm quite good at languages, and as I speak English without a trace of the Polish accent, I get random foreigners, e.g. asking me for directions, as they are sure they just met someone from the West. It is always funny (still a little annoying) to hear the legendary - Your English is very nice... as for a Polish girl - when they happen to find out that I'm actually 100% Polish.
I had a colleague once, a Vietnamese orphan, adopted by Bremerhaven fish traders, the ones with a car on the local market and a really strong frisian accent. She studied arabic and economy. And my, that girl could really curse in Arabic. That was a very fine ladette breaking all clichees. :)
"Ladette"? How's about "woman"? Is that what you meam?
Load More Replies...Language learning can take 500-2200 hours. Useful insights about hard languages to learn - https://www.justlearn.com/blog/hardest-languages-to-learn It can be so difficult to learn a new language like Chinese.
The odds were not in that customer's favor that day. Nagging curtailed effectively for about 10 minutes.
As a white person denigrated by people who didn't know I understood Spanish, I feel your pain.
You never know who's standing in front of you. Remember that story (I think in Paris) with the guys who wanted to steal photo gear from a karate guy, just because he looked senior? Well , the Chinese couple was lucky!! I learned this lesson the hard way, with kind of a nice, well hearted grandpa, who was in fact a Mob guy. I was lucky to be left without something broken.
No saying what the customer did was acceptable BUT do you have to have the word Chinese in the title when the story has nothing to do we race?
Someone I used to know was complaining in Russian about a dark-skinned man on a bus before her (not because of his race). He turns around with a smile and responds in perfect Russian.
I didn't mean to press send yet xD I have a much nicer one: I'm Russian and I speak Spanish with our local Mexican florist and he speaks Russian to me. Great guy.
Load More Replies...i was on a flight in the US and there was an asian guy sitting next to my boyfriend and I. All of a sudden I found out I forgot something that I left on another flight and started cursing my a*s off in Dutch (as I am Dutch) I wasnt shouting but just belting out every nasty word I could imagine for five minutes straight. At the end of the flight our Asian neighbour asked my boyfriend "are you two Dutch? I lived in Amsterdam for a few years" Aaaaahhh!!! at least I didnt say anything nasty about HIM.
I speak 3 languages and have had similar situations multiple times with each language xD
I used to work at a bar as a waitress, and this gorgeous girl from Russia that spoke perfect English worked there too as a second job. She amused me one night when I asked her a question about something. She shook her head a bit, like she was rattling her brain, and said, "sorry, I'm trying to translate that in my head. I've been working all day as a translator." At some such Russian government thing. She was so cute shaking her head like one of those bobble head dolls.
I would probably just greet them in Mandarin. Make them comfortable to talk in their mother language
What if they were American and did not speak mandarin?
Load More Replies...I’m a big fan of recycling myself, but you just ran this bit 4-6 months ago, no?
No, I certainly didn't see it. This is the first time.
Load More Replies...
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