frisyr | Inbox | Recollé

Entry tags:

Inbox | Recollé

emil västerström

Hey it's Emil! My phone is probably on silent, or I'm sleeping. Leave a message and I'll call you back!

VOICE | TEXT | VIDEO | ACTION

I don't know! I only spoke to one of her friends about it. What if she didn't know? How would I know!

[Sorry Emil she's... not listening.]

All of you definitely sound like that all the time!

We do not!

[ He crosses his arms over his chest ]

And can't you call someone else back home about it, not just your brother?

Doesn't anyone offer Finnish classes around here?

You do too! And anyone I talk to back home would mention it to my brother and he would get upset anyway! We're a tiny language that no one wants to learn and if I lost the ability to speak it I'll never be able to get it back!!

[She takes a second to breathe, though, and adds almost tentatively once it occurs to her.]

I might have a cousin I could talk to who wouldn't bother to talk to my brother, I guess.

Your cousin doesn't talk to your brother?

I think your Finnish is probably fine! I mean, my Swedish sounds okay right?

Wait, what if my English gets worse?

It wasn't even that good to begin with... I probably shouldn't be speaking Swedish to you right now... What if I lose the ability to speak English at all!

Wait...

...Did you learn any Icelandic?? Before?

More like my cousin wouldn't tattle on me, I think. Like it wouldn't occur to him to hang up and immediately call my brother to tell him how weird I'm being.

[No, wait, Emil, this is supposed to be Tuuri's freakout.]

Your Swedish is fine! Your English is probably fine! I've never heard of them messing with someone's languages unless they learn a new one-- maybe you better try listening to different languages online to make sure you don't know a new one? Icelandic is totally new to me! It would be very low on my list of languages to learn!

What!

Oh no, what if I can't speak Swedish anymore, but I can speak Danish? I don't want to speak Danish! I'll still be able to text my mom and everything, but then I can never call her again...

[ SO MUCH FREAKING OUT, WHY DID YOU THINK EMIL WOULD BE A GOOD PERSON TO COME TO ABOUT THIS ]

Tuuri, quick, can you still understand this??

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gAh9NRGNhUU

We're speaking Swedish right now, I don't think you have to worry about it.

[At least Emil's freakout was helping her put her own in perspective...

She follows the link-- obviously she knows the song as soon as she hears it, but wonders why Emil linked it to her.]

Uh, yeah, I'm not worried about my English. [No way, could he be--] Wait, don't you understand it?!

Wait what?

This song's in English?

[ Oh god he just always thought it was in Finnish for some reason, partially due to the inscrutable death metal screeching and partially due to the fact that he hasn't actually listened to this song since he was 8 and his English vocabulary did not in fact include the words "hard," "rock," or "hallelujah." ]

Wait, wait, I know other Finnish songs!

[ He does not ]

What about this one?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bykv0Hw_IeI

Yes? Hey, Emil, are you sure that your English is okay?

[Like, seriously man, double check on that. Still, she opens the next one.]

Oh, cute, you know this one too! And I do still understand it, even if it's mostly gibberish. So that's a good sign!

Yeah, don't worry, I just checked with my roommate and it's fine.

[ If his roommate isn't just being polite, which... ]

Wait, isn't it supposed to be not... gibberish if you can understand it?

[ How is Finnish confusing if you're Finnish? ]