Wednesday, May 25, 2011

Spanish

So,
Today I get a call from the Center for Child Protection and the conversation went as follows:

Man: "Hello is this Brooke Binstock? we'd like to offer you an interview. Is it true you speak Spanish?"

Me: "Um....well, I'm proficient in conversational Spanish."

Man: So how comfortable would you be with a client who only speaks spanish?"

Me: (After a pause) "Medium comfort level..."

Man: "And group therapy?"

Me: (thinking...in Spanish?!?!?) "Um, very comfortable"

Man: Well great, do you have time to be interviewed next Thursday?"

Me: Yep. See you then.

I got off the phone with a pit in my stomach and rosy cheeks. This man thinks I speak Spanish!! And that I am bilingual. My Spanish is just ok...having taken it all throughout high school and living with a host family is Costa Rica...however, after my college years and grad school having interacted with only a couple people in Spanish...my speaking abilities are tarnished and mediocre at best. Anyway, this should be an interesting interview. I look at each one as a learning experience...where midway through some of them, I freak out by the job description. One of them was: 'well, the program doesn't actually exist yet...that would be your job.' Another: 'would you be comfortable referring clients to services that we don't even know about yet?' So obviously these are really new positions...maybe not fit for the emerging social worker. I'll just keep going to interviews I suppose. Though I truly hate putting on a fancy outfit that is a far cry from my usual spandex attire.

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