I accidently fired our housekeeper...

True story! My amazing Spanish strikes again.

We have the nicest woman taking care of our house. Her name is Marta, she only runs from place to place, never walks, giggles and sings to herself all day long...is totally hysterical and only speaks in super fast street Spanish. We cannot communicate at all -- but somehow we understand each other and have been totally fine.....that is until my last little mishap.

Craig and I both had the day off, were planning on hanging around the house, catching up, laying low and we have never quite gotten used to having someone cleaning up around us...it is really weird and just feels totally wrong. So the plan was the also give Marta the day off.

I practiced in my head what I needed to say, told her what I had practiced and was really quite pleased with the result. She nodded in understanding and seemed to get what I was trying to say. Victory! I totally nailed it and at the time was really proud of myself for handling something a little more difficult than my normal dealings. Incredible, right?!?!? I had absolutely no idea what I had just done!

So all was fine, Marta didn't show up on the day we wanted her to have off, I was again proud of myself for accomplishing this small little task and carried on like normal. But then she didn't show up for her next day of work. Which as you can imagine in Guatemala illicits quite a bit of alarm. Did something happen to her on her bus commute over? Did something happen to her family? Only bad ideas were whirling through my head. It never once occurred to me that I could have been the source!

I didn't know what to do except let it sit for a day and then check-in with the other family that she works for. So I waited and then called to check-in....turns out she was there, all was fine, totally 100% fine....so why in the world did she come to our house???

Well our friends, in their perfect Spanish, translated back and forth and it turns out I told her not to just take the day off....but that we no longer needed her help at all, ever! Amazing. And I think the greatest part about this is that she must have been so incredibly confused. Not only did this come out of no where, no warning at all, I was so happy and animated giving her what I thought was a vacation day. Who fires someone with such nice, excitement?!?!? Poor Marta.

Once the other family stopped laughing at me and the mess I created....they ironed out the misunderstanding and Marta is back like nothing ever happened. I of course apologized a million times over and she really seems to hold no grudges, but she has got to think I am a total lunatic. I am of course mortified and never want to talk to her again. What else could I mess up?!?!? Too many things to count!

Never a dull moment folks, never a dull moment!