Very Embarrassed

Daniela is from Guadalajara. Last month she started an English course in Los Angeles. On her first day, the bus was late, and she arrived at class twenty minutes after the start. Everybody looked at her.

Daniela's face was red. She wanted to say that she felt bad about it, but she didn't know the English word. So she used a Spanish word that sounded right. "I'm sorry," she said. "I'm so... embarazada."

The room was quiet for a second. Then a woman called Rosa, who spoke some Spanish, jumped up and hugged her. "Congratulations!" she said. "When is the baby coming?" Two other students started clapping. Daniela didn't understand. "What baby?"

The teacher, Mr. Brooks, was smiling. "I think Daniela means she's embarrassed," he explained. "In English, embarrassed means you feel bad because people are looking at you. But embarazada in Spanish means pregnant." Now Daniela's face was even redder. "No baby!" she said. "Just a late bus!" Everybody laughed, and Daniela laughed too.

After class, she wanted to buy a book for the course. She asked Rosa, "Where is the library?" Rosa gave her directions, and Daniela walked there. It was a big, quiet building with thousands of books. She took the book to the desk and opened her wallet. "How much is it?"

The man at the desk smiled kindly. "It's free," he said. "But you have to bring it back in three weeks. This is a library. If you want to buy it, you need a bookstore." Daniela closed her wallet. "Library, bookstore," she repeated. "Thank you."

That night she wrote two new words in her notebook, embarrassed and bookstore, with a big star next to each one. The next morning, she caught an earlier bus.