jste češka?

So I'm supposedly tri-lingual. Or rather, I'm fluent in one (English), studied another (French), and somewhat speak yet another (Czech). All in all, the last two languages are beautiful, at least to me, but not as useful as say Russian or Spanish, or even Mandarin for that matter. After having studied and lived in France for two months, and then serving a mission in the Czech Republic for a year and a half, you would think that my language skills would be impressive. But, unfortunately, I haven't had much use for either one of them.

Until now. French may not be a hot commodity on the West Coast, but on the East, it sure is. There are so many francophony here, and I work with a lot of them. There are a handful of guys from Algeria, Senegal, Cote d'Ivoire, etc that communicate in French. I have to admit that I haven't been brave enough to use the French that I do know, but who's to say that I won't?

I've now graduated to the level of cashier, and have gotten pretty good at it, if I do say so myself. I get to strike up random conversations with people that come through my lines. Some of them flop:

Me: Did you find everything you wanted today?
Boring customer: Yes.
Me: Do you have any fun plans for tonight?
BC: No, not really.

Ok then...

But some of them end up being incredibly cool. Like this one lady with a very distinctive Eastern European accent.

Me: Did you find everything you wanted today?
Lovely, Brilliant customer: Yes, and so much more. I came in for this beer, but ended up getting so much more...

She went on and on and somehow I got the impression that she was Czech. So randomly I asked, "Jste češka?" (are you Czech?)

She excitedly replied, "Ano!!! Jsem!"

I was flabbergasted. This is the first random Czech citizen I've run into the entire time I've been back. All other Czechs I've come in contact with I've already known. We carried on an entire conversation in Czech ("You speak so well," she said. "Oh, you're too kind," I said). We spoke about the weather, my mission, where she's from, what she's doing here, what I'm doing here, etc. It was wonderful! I was so excited/shocked/nervous (my language skills are definitely rusty) that I was tripping over my r's and ř's.

I now have a new Czech friend, though I don't know her name. And now that I'm not a missionary I can tykat (use the informal) and not feel guilty about it.

Oh, bliss!