Stop not being a legend

You are a walking legend and don’t even realise it.

You are a walking hero and don’t even realise it.

Last week, I needed to pick up my new bank card in central Sofia, here in Bulgaria.

That’s right, I’m slowly but surely assimilating into a foreign culture I know nothing about.

I needed a taxi to get back home from the bank.

So I pull out the app and enter the directions.

I can see the little car icon getting closer and closer.

He’s a block away, and I get a phone call.

The driver is talking to me in Bulgarian, and I just repeatedly tell him ‘Fibank, Fibank,’ the name of the place I’m standing by.

I hang up and watch his car icon stop.

It doesn’t move for several minutes.

Then it occurs to me that he’s waiting for me to walk to him.

I start walking to him.

We’d been in translation purgatory for seven minutes, stuck in a cross-cultural stalemate that had us both fuming.

I see his car speed off into the distance.

I kick the pavement.

Lose/lose.