When you don’t speak the language, there’s a
tipping point in the number of people present in a social situation before you
start feeling like an outsider. That tipping point is five. Any more than that
and the native language is too dominant for people to speak English and the
poor sod who’s acting as translator can’t possibly keep up. Only then do you
feel your foreignness, sitting there quietly while everyone else is chatting
and laughing. Young kids and dogs are always your friends on these occasions –
they’re outsiders too and they don’t care that you can’t communicate verbally.
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