One night En Zhen, my Korean neighbor and friend popped in while I was
making dinner: grilled cheese and tomato sandwiches. She was curious,
so I gave her one that her and her husband could try. This is the
conversation I had with her the next day.
En Zhen: We both really loved those sandwiches!
Kristie: Oh good! I was worried you would think it was too strange. (because most Asians don’t eat a lot of cheese)
En Zhen: No, we liked it so much that I made it this morning for breakfast.
Kristie: Did you have cheese? (a
little surprised that she had cheese to make them with, but not that
she made grilled cheese for breakfast–for some reason Asians believe
Americans eat sandwiches for breakfast)
En Zhen: No, we didn’t have any cheese, so I just used peanut butter instead.
Kristie: Um….(did she just say, “peanut butter”?!?)….was it good with the tomato?
En Zhen: We didn’t have any tomato either, I used banana instead.
Kristie: I’ll bet that was really good! (but I don’t think you can call it a “grilled cheese sandwich” anymore)
En Zhen: It was!
Kristie: Do you know of Elvis Presley? (of
course she knows, I just wasn’t sure she knew his English name, and I
certainly don’t know his Chinese name, much less Korean)
En Zhen: No……(she just doesn’t know the English name)
Kristie: Hmm…A very famous American musician. Anyways, his favorite sandwich was fried peanut butter and banana.
(At this point things have gone too far, and we have to switch conversation topics)
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