Aidez-moi!

The highlight of this past week for me is very predictable, at least in what it wasn't (the Lunar New Year).

Ok, so maybe in a way it was, since it took place on an early Tuesday morning, and if it were not to be a short week due to the holiday, then perhaps i wouldn't have been in the mood to have bothered to offer my help to a middle-aged couple wondering if the early morning train that they had just boarded was actually heading in their desired direction (the airport).

It's not as simple as that, of course. So happens that this couple had boarded the train just after me, and i noticed that the man was closely scrutinizing the mrt map, while the wife kept on asking him if they were on the right train, which just made him scrutinize the map even more closely. Each of them had one big suitcase each, which made it easy for me to figure out where they were planning to head to. Otherwise, i might not have had a clue as to their desired destination, since they were speaking in French.

As always when i consider whether to start a conversation in any language other than English, i ran through the possible things that i would have to say in my head, and then assessed whether it was worth the risk (lest i ended up going "uh" a few times before scuttling off at the next stop in red-faced embarrassment).

Finally, when it seemed to me that the risk level was low enough, i almost ambushed them (they were hitherto pretty much unaware of my existence quietly sitting down with my marking in the next carriage), uttered a few things in rudimentary French, including an assurance, that yes, they were (literally and figuratively) on the right track. Then i plopped back on my seat and carried on with my marking, trusting that my timely intervention had been of help.

In retrospect, i probably could have helped them in English, as if they were not conversant in it, they probably would not have come here for a holiday on their own in the first place. It also might have come across as somewhat shocking for this random guy to pop up beside them at 5:50 in the morning to offer unsolicited directions to them while possibly butchering their Mother Tongue in the process.

But never mind all that - at least at that moment, and at least for me, it was as good as it's gotten this past week.

The latent dong dong qiangs prove my point.