How I went on quick dates in New York
'23.05.2019'
I can't say that America for me has always been some kind of pink dream from the category of transcendental and unattainable, rather, on the contrary, after watching American films and listening to various tales about the local mentality, I was very skeptical of the belief that the United States is the most a favorable place to live on Earth, only by the fact of getting into which you can already consider that life is a success.
Since five years ago, the United States was not included in any of the top lists of countries that I would like to visit in the next 10 years, then, perhaps, if it were not for a number of circumstances, I would never have flown to America.
My first two-week visit to New York took place in the summer of 2017. Then my opinion about America has changed dramatically. In addition to the Manhattan skyscrapers and ocean beaches, I was captivated by the American friendliness and smiles that were waiting for me at almost every step, the abundance of which during the day with fire cannot be found in any, well, at least Slavic country of the former USSR.
My next visit took place at the end of last year, and after my first month in the states, I realized that the evenings here, often burdened by cloudy weather, are much more monotonous than in my home country, Ukraine. As a variety, I decided to go to “Speed dating” - an event that is just emerging in the post-Soviet countries, and, as I understand it, very popular in America. Of course, I did not harbor any special hopes that the beautiful half of the candidates for finding happiness in their personal lives would be like those Hollywood beauties, with the help of which, in fact, this event was advertised in the Internet space.
I was the first to arrive, and, sitting at a corner of the restaurant, I watched the incoming contingent, sighing from time to time ... Suddenly she came in ... like those who run American news and participate in various local shows ...
It's just that the visitors to the bar and the participants in the event were in the same room, and I thought, maybe she just came with her friends to the bar .. But, after watching for a couple of minutes, I realized that, yes, I would also be lucky to have with her, how minimum 5 minute dialogue. Further, the time was approaching the beginning of the event, there were almost no empty seats, except for the one opposite me, on which she sat down. The participants were seated so that men sat in one row and women in the opposite.
On the subject: How to ruin a first date
After a couple of seconds, the lead announced the start, and we began to communicate with those who were sitting opposite. We started with standard phrases that are relevant during our acquaintance.
- How are you? - she blurted out a phrase that I had heard earlier several times a day, but this time I really had the inspiration to talk about how I was doing ...
“You don’t seem to have an accent, are you probably Native American?” I asked confidently.
- No, I was born in South Africa and arrived in America in 94, - she surprised me and my heart muscle began to contract even faster, because for me Africa is my second home, in which I have lived for the last few years, what I mean and began to tell her.
“I have worked in equatorial Africa since 2013 as CFO of a copper mining enterprise,” I said in my not-so-perfect English.
She asked:
- At what enterprise?
“At the copper factory,” I tried to articulate more clearly.
- At a copper plant? She asked in surprise.
It seemed to me that she did not understand what kind of enterprise we were talking about, then I turned over the leaf that was given to us to record our sympathies and wrote: “Cooper”.
Her expression took on a more sad tone, and I continued:
- There are not many copper deposits left in the world, and equatorial Africa is a place where it can still be mined. Therefore, we invested a lot of money, founding a business on another, little-known continent by other Europeans, in order to mine copper there and bring it to Europe, selling it mainly to enterprises for the needs of the military industry.
Here the presenter gave a signal, and, telling her beloved companion, how pleased I was to meet her, I moved to another girl.
I returned home late and the next day I received the news that Nikala (that was the name of the first interlocutor) had not chosen me. I analyzed the dialogues and, just in case, typed the word “cooper“ into Google Translate. The electronic translator produced two fundamentally different options: “cooper” and “alcoholic beverage”. I was shocked, not understanding, but where is the copper?
I went to the LME website, where you can see quotes for the cost of metals on the London Stock Exchange and realized that the word "copper" in English is spelled not with two "o", but with two "p", and, accordingly, pronounced differently. It turns out that if the clear-eyed swan enlightened my previous place of work in the second interpretation of the electronic translation, then I told her something like this: “There is no longer any alcohol in the world, except in Africa, so we invested a lot of money and opened an alcohol production business there, where there are still not many European competitors in this business to bring alcohol to Europe and sell it mainly to military enterprises ”...
I often thought about this word. They say thoughts are material .. A few days later, I was wandering around the men's clothing department in Macy's, and I liked a T-shirt with an unusual ornament, I bought it, and when I returned home and was going to try it on, I saw that the brand of the T-shirt is called Copper fit ”...
A couple of weeks later, I went to travel to Canada. The tour price included breakfast only. On the first evening I went to have a bite to eat at a cafe in a shopping center, studied the menu, fixed my gaze above and saw the name of the cafe: “Copper branch” ...
Returning home, in which century he turned on the TV, the announcer voiced the current metal quotes, and in the upper right corner of the screen, it seems, I was already pursued by the same word - "Copper" ...
