We had the most hilarious class today. We were role playing doctor-patient situations. The book gives a cough-sneezing-cold example. After a few goes at this, the teacher told us to pick another illness. One of the Arab students and myself were picked. The conversation went something like this (in Farsi):
Arab: What uncomfort you have? Che naarahati dareed?
Me: My stomach hurts. Dilam dard me konad
Arab: Do you have a cough?
Me: No my stomach hurts
Arab: Are you sneezing?
Me: No, my stomach hurts (By this point I'm wondering if she's even listening to me!?)
Arab: Do you have a cold?
Me: No, my stomach hurts!!!!
The teacher intervened and taught us some words related to stomach illnesses! Remember that the teacher can only speak Farsi! So she's trying to explain vomitting, diarrhoa and constipation with concepts (e.g. vomiting = food exiting the mouth!). My friends and I just burst out giggling. The teacher thought we were laughing because we didn't understand, so she starts giving an even more detailed explanation, which does nothing to stop the giggles. The rest of the class then join in with 'helping us' to try and understand the new words! One of the girls said something like: once a month my child has poo that is watery. Except instead of using the word 'aab' which means water, she used 'aabi' which means blue! Scary mental image of a child with blue diarrhoea!!
I don't think we'll be forgetting today's new words!!
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