Sparklyladybug.com.au

Sitting on the tram...mostly embarassed cause a small group of Candians are being loud and obnoxious, but, I continued to sit silently thinking it's a good think no one knew I was from the same country. A few minutes later as I was getting off a man, who had been briefly helping them figure out a few things, remarked, "thing is about people who aren't from here is they don't know anything". I complacently smiled and laughed a little. I didn't see any real point in starting a discussion since I just wanted to get home...I just hoped he didn't say anything else, lest I actually have to answer and show that I am not from around here! But then he said, "you can tell them anything and they'll believe it", so I quickly said, hoping that if I spoke quickly he wouldn't hear the accent, "thats the fun of it!" and ran away...gotta watch out for people who aren't from around here I guess...

I brought the jars to the counter just like the little signs said too. First 3 jars, then 2 more, then 2 more for a total of 7. The saleslady looked at me, a little unsure of what to do. I passed 2 jars over to her, these two are easy i said. I'll take one spoon of those and 5 of the silver stars. She set to work. Can I chose the other ones? I asked...She looked at me, a little unsure, and said ok hesitantly. So, I set to it...picking and counting each one individually.

As I was chosing, it brought back memories of my favourite bead store ever, in Harajuku (Tokyo, Japan). La Droguerie, originally from France, and the only store they have outside of France is in Harajuku. My trips there were always bemusing. A mixture of gestures and smiles and shock as to how so little could cost so much. However, they always told me to chose my own beads. In fact, they had special velvet boards so the beads didn't slide and you could see thier colours clearly and cute plastic hearts to put the chosen ones into. They would carefully separate each stlye and give them all individual bags. Once, I bought a book. The saleslady looked at me, opened the book and said, No Engrish, Japanese and Furensu pointing to the words. Ii desu I said, French is ok. She handed the book back to me with a look of relief.