It was a
warm summer evening about fifteen years ago and Lenox had decided to take two
new employees out to dinner. The couple evidently came from a deprived
background, wore matching outfits and spoke a rather hard to understand
English.
We arrived
at the particular restaurant, a smart looking place with a terrace run by a
Spanish couple. The husband is a great cook; although rather keen on fancy and
peculiar combinations – the kind of food that no one in their right mind would
ever think of preparing at home. The owners seated us and gave us our menus in
Spanish and withdrew. We had never been there before (although we slightly knew
the owners) and cast our eyes over the various peculiar dishes available. I
forget now, but the simplest one was along the lines of lark’s breast stuffed
with an olive. The faces of our guests fell as we translated the choices and it
became clear they were more at home with the meat and two veg school of
refection. To save ourselves from further discomfort, we launched into a melodrama
of a forgotten child and an emergency with the baby sitter, all duly translated
to Rocío, the owner’s wife; and with that, we left for the MacDonald’s around
the corner.
Oddly, far
from remaining under our wing, these days they eat lobster.
Two points
more about this story. The first is that Rocío’s command of English is as good
as or better than my own. The second is that our guests soon picked up a few
pointers about expatriate life in Spain and shortly after, relieved us of a
great deal of money.
