At various times, and in various ways, I have made an arse of myself. My arse-making most frequently occurs in social settings (like the time I made an unwitting faux pas by wearing red to a funeral), but one of the worst was when I managed to make an arse of myself in another language.
In the summer of 2005, I spent five weeks in Shanghai, PRC teaching English. When I and my fellow teachers were not in the classroom or making lesson plans, we would hop in a taxi or on the subway to go exploring and shopping. It was very exciting, traipsing all over the city, but eventually we got tired. As luck would have it, we happened to discover one day that there was a salon just down the street from our dormitory that offered, in addition to normal salon services, hour-long foot massages on the cheap. We agreed that that was
exactly what we needed, so I, and two other young ladies, walked into the salon and told the staff, by flailing our arms about and pantomiming a massage (which ended up looking rather like kneading invisible dough), that we wanted foot massages. We were led to a quiet back room, and three men presently came in, each carrying a tub of hot water. Two of them were kind of old and not very good-looking, but the third was young and attractive, with muscular arms and sweet eyes. Imagine my thrill when he sat in front of me and began undressing my feet. And what happened after that--well, let's just say that I experienced an hour of non-stop pleasure at the hands of a handsome stranger.
Before I knew it, the hour was spent, and I had a tingly, warm feeling all over my body. Ah, bliss. I smiled and opened my eyes, and-wait! He was getting up to go! No! He had to come back! I began pleading to him in English, "Please, no. Come back! Don't go, please." I clasped my hands together and implored him to stay. I don't think that I was in my right mind. I finally fell into Chinese--whether Mandarin or Shangainese, I'll never know--saying what I thought was "please." I said "please" in Chinese over and over again. He looked at me with a small smile on his face and a twinkle in his eyes, but he left all the same. The two older men chuckled and gave the young man amused and approving looks as they all walked out together. With a sigh, I eventually gathered my things and left, as well.
The following day, I recalled the event to one of our Chinese teacher's assistants, and when I told her what I said, she gasped, bringing her hands up to her face. "Oh my, Rachel!" Then she began laughing and said, "You were telling him 'kiss! kiss!' Heheheheeee!!!" She doubled over in laughter. I groaned and put my palm to my forehead.
Ugh! STUPID! STUPID! STUPID! I was so embarrassed. How could I have been such an arse?? And he was so cute!
Well, I eventually got over my embarrassment and went back to the same salon for another massage. When the three men walked in with their tubs, he smiled at me and set his down at my feet. He looked bashful, but pleased, as the three of them exchanged meaningful looks, and then set to work.
Comments (9)
And though it is not the custom there, I left a tip. After all, he is the man who gave me my first footgasm.
Ha! It is, I find, a requirement of some sort to have these memorable moments from trips abroad.
@CarmenDeBizet - Yes, and I will never forget it. And I hope he will never forget the crazy American girl who begged him for kisses.
Sweet! I once told a cab driver in Kigali (Rwanda) that his cab was too dirty and that I'd prefer to have sex with a bus.
Oh my, I imagine it could of been much much worse! Nice story though =)
Ahahahaha! that was something to get red in the face about!
Well, at least he was cute, huh?
@MlleRobillard - HA! That's a good one!
@StewieIsMyHero - Yeah, it would've been worse if I had have said it to one of the old men, haha.
@jenggai2308 - That was my one consolation, yes. :P
Well at least all you said was "kiss" instead of something more...graphic?