... in response to What ever happen to the guy that was bui..., posted by wsbill on Dec 23, 2001From the archives.......Posted by Frank Z (registered user) on 02/20Hi folks, I have an amusing story to tell about my fiancee. I am in the process of building a house and I sent her {Victoria} 2 scanned prints of floor plans {blueprints}, one of the first and one of the second floor. First floor, kitchen, dining room, living room bath room, family room and on the second floor, bath room, master bedroom with balcony, my daughter's bedroom, her son's bedroom, and a spare bedroom. Knowing that her English is not that great, I titled and labeled each room accordingly. When I called Victoria this past Sunday to see if she had received the plans, she said she loved the design but she had a concern but was reluctant to tell me about it. When I pressed her to tell me what her concern was, she still refused to tell me and said we would discuss the problen, which she considered serious, after she arrived here. Being concerned that she did not like something about the house design, I kept pressing her to tell me what the problem was so as not to have to make a modification after the house was built, but she still refused to tell me siting that she was upset and embarrassed to say. After a little more proding and poking on my part she finally said, "the house is going to be beautiful but why don't you want me to sleep in your room and in your bed?" Well, needles to say, the there was silence for about 40 seconds while I was trying to figure out what the heck was going on. Not being able to figure out what gave her that impression I asked her to explain. I heard sniffles on the other end of the phone and in a quivering voice she said in broken English "you have four bedrooms but we only need three. You have a bedroom for your daughter and a bedroom for my son and you have a bedroom for me too and you put my bedroom the furthest from your bedroom the MASTER BEDROOM. {English/Russian dictionary, "master"}I couldn't help myself and I started laughing loudly. The more I laughed the madder she got at me until I explained that the word "master" when used in conjunction with "bedroom" was a generic term for the largest bedroom in the house, the bedroom where husband and wife sleep together, not where the master sleeps. I guess the moral to my story is that no matter how you say it, what is important is how it is understood. Pete Z.
