Dunkin Doughnuts and immigration

As a 2nd or 3rd generation American, I know the importance of being given the opportunity to make a better life. Unless you are a Native American your family has immigrated to the U.S. If english is your first language assimilation is easy. If english is a secondary language assimilation is more difficult.

For some reason I have always been attracted to immigration stories, why people came, what it is like etc. I'm sure that life as an immigrant is difficult. It is why so many immigrants cling to what they know and form insular communities. The historical side of me has found that generally an immigrant comes to a new country and locates to an area where people who speak their language. If there is an absence of this particular area then a community center, church, synagogue, etc. usually will fill the void. Those people help with assimilation, finding jobs, housing, and teaching the english language to new Americans. However thriving in the good ol' USA is generally much easier when you are not abrasive. Take my experience at Dunkin Doughnuts yesterday. I know that many Dunkin Doughnuts are foreign owned, but was it really neccessary to yell at a customer when they don't understand you? Here is my situation.

I pull up to the drive thru and do the whole drive through. I realize that we made a mistake by changing the #1, and asking for OJ instead of coffee and asking for no bacon. DD guy says in a very think accent "that will be $X pull around". I said and I'd like a Vanilla Creme doughnut and ask him to repeat the order to make sure he has it correct. Is this unreasonable? I'm not up on Pakistani, but the tone of his voice jumped at me "how dare you question my ability to place your order". I then asked him how much. He responded by giving me some number I could not make out and "pull around".

I pull around. I'm in a hurry to get to Pittsburgh and figure I'll find out when I pull around anyway. Naturally I ask how much. Again I can not understand what he is saying. Naturally I repeat my question. I don't know, should I give him a few $1s, a $5, $10. How the hell am I supposed to know if I can not make out what he is saying. Naturally I ask again. At this point he snaps at me I can finally make out the $7 (not how much in change) and he yells in his indecipherable Pakistani accept "What can't you understand what I'm saying!" Truthfully the answer is no. I can't understand a damn thing you are saying. I didn't say that to him, but I thought it. I did manage to get "what an asshole" out of my mouth before I left, but seriously is it unreasonable to ask someone to repeat what they are saying if you don't understand them?

I think that this guy was a little over the top. I am speaking English, the official language of the country, state, region, city, etc. I am sorry that you are having a bad day or that your mastery of the English language is not exactly up to par. Maybe your perception of your mastery of English is higher then it should be.

Needless to say snapping "Don't you undertand" is not only poor customer service, but irritating. You have come to my country so speaking to me in my language is what I expect. I am the grandchild and greatgrandchild of immigrants. I am sure they struggled grasping the English language, however they were able to grasp enough English to make a living and communicate with the people they were expected to communicate with. I am sure that they did not yell at people "What you don't understand what I'm saying". I think that they understood they had to work harder and change to get by. I'm sure they would have repeated it until the customer understood and simply written it down, but not yelled at the customer. You are in America, work harder on your English and don't expect others to automatically know what you are saying. Work harder.