She Doesn't Know Much

After picking Jari up from school, we stopped for groceries at our neighborhood shop. I needed just a few things, including lunch meat from the deli. We headed to the deli case where the butcher shop is housed and I requested 100 grams pork roast. "What?" asked the girl behind the counter, a new employee I haven't seen before. "Pork roast, 100 grams." She looked all through the meats until I pointed out which was the pork roast, then she asked again "How much?" Next I asked for 100 grams roast beef. She picked up the mustard filled bacon. "No, roast beef, that one" I said again, pointing it out to her. "How much?" she asked. At this point Jari said to me, "Mama, she doesn't know very much, does she?" I went on to explain to him that she's a new employee and probably doesn't know where everything is at, and that she probably was having a bit of trouble understanding mama's accent as well, unlike the regulars in the store. I watched her measure the sliced beef as she began to take a few slices off, it being over 100 grams. "That's okay. Just leave it. May I also have 100 grams liverwurst sliced?" I asked, hoping she'd understand my last request. She started to pull out the huge dish of pate instead of the block to make slices. "No, the blokpate," I said a bit louder, as if that might help her to understand my foreign accent a bit better. Jari looked at me and laughed, quite interested in this exchange we were having. As she was slicing the correct meat, Jari looked at me with his big blue eyes...his eyes told me the entire story. He thought this was just hilarious. "She's a new employee, and she better learn what she's doing better, huh mom?" he asked. "She'll learn," I told him, hoping she'd understand me helping her out. Then, as she turned around to weigh my meat, he went on to say, "But, she's also pretty fat." "Jari, that's not nice, we don't say things like that about people." I reprimanded him in English. "Yeah, but she is fat mom. I'm not lying." he continued in his perfect Vlaams dialect that she couldn't help but comprehend. She handed me my package of meat with red cheeks. "Thank you," I told her, looking right into her eyes hoping she'd see the 'sorry'. "You'll get to know my accent better soon." As we were walking away, Jari said "She can't do very good. I think you could do better than her, mama. And she is fat!" I'm glad my son has faith in me, but I wish he'd learn to quit being so honest!