“Oh my godddd” is what I was telling myself at one point during the phone call. “You are saying the wrong price!” my dad was telling me in Spanish in a raised tone while I literally said the price he told me to tell the guy. I got frustrated and just wanted to end the phone call and let my dad handle it on his own but I kept my composure and kept on negotiating with the guy on the phone. We came to an agreement with the guy on the phone and set up a time to meet to look at the car and purchase it. 

     My father is Dominican and has lived there for most of his life until shortly before I was born. His primary language is Spanish. He has learned a few words in English and understands some things but he’s never really taken time to learn the language. It’s not possible to have a full conversation with him in English but he might understand a word or two. Whenever he needs to communicate with someone in English through the phone he always makes me speak for him. I’m used to that by now. This time he was interested in a car that he saw online.

     So my dad comes to my room and tells me “Vamos a llamar a este número para ver si compro esta guagua”. I put my phone down and ask my dad “what do you want me to tell him before I call him?” He tells me to negotiate the price and to ask where the guy is located so that we can meet up with him and check out the car. I call the phone number, it rings a few times, and he picks up. “Hello, this is Yoelvin, I saw that you listed the white 2024 Acura MDX online and I am interested in it” I say when the guy picks up the phone. He starts giving me details of the car and while he is explaining and telling me on the phone I am translating it to my father in Spanish. Everything is going as it’s supposed to and my dad tells me to try and negotiate the price with the seller. He tells me to ask the guy what’s the lowest he can do so I ask the guy and he says he’s pretty firm on that price so I translate it to my dad. “Tell him if he can do 2,000 dollars less” my dad tells me but in Spanish. So I ask the guy and he says that it’s too low of a price and he won’t be making any profit so I translate that to my dad as well. “Ask him if he can do 1,500 dollars less” my dad tells me in Spanish and I ask the guy. He says the most he would do is 500 dollars less and I tell my dad that. My dad tells me to tell that guy that he would buy the car in full cash if he does 1000 dollars less. So I told the guy on the phone that and I guess my dad thought I said a different price and the way he spoke to me after was in a tone that I didn’t really like.

  “Tú no estás diciendo el precio que yo te dije!” My dad told me in Spanish which means “You are not telling him the price I told you” when I literally told him the exact price he told me to say. This was when I got frustrated, “Oh my godddd” I told myself in my head. I knew that if I reacted a certain way my dad was gonna say something and I didn’t want to hear him complaining so I just kept talking to the guy on the phone and he said that he will do 1000 dollars less because he’s been trying to get rid of the car for a while now and and he just wants to get rid of it. I ended the call and my dad asked me what he said and I told him that he agreed on lowering the price by 1000 dollars and the location he wanted to meet up. I gave my dad his phone back and he said thank you and left. 

     I realized that I should have not really gotten mad because he doesn’t really know too much english so I would understand where he was coming from but it was just frustrating because I was telling the guy on the phone everything he was telling me and I had to listen to the guy on the phone and my dad at the same time. My dad always makes me take phone calls with people that talk only English but sometimes it gets annoying because he won’t tell me exactly what to say and then I would say something and he’ll like lowkey get mad because I said something that he doesn’t even know what it means.