Lost in translation? Maybe not...

Remember all the grand words of one of my previous posts and mom's determination to overcome intercultural communication barriers? Well, it was all very nice in theory but practice didn't come out as planned.

Mom tried hard, she really did. She had another meeting with the landlord in the presence of a teacher of English. Unfortunately this didn't seem to help much. The landlord kept going round round in circular arguments trying to use anything and everything to prove that he was right and mom was wrong. Finally, mom was exasperated. She tried to explain, as politely as possible, that this relationship is not working and that perhaps both sides should accept it and end it in a civilized manner.

At that point the landlord clearly tried to change strategies, but without accepting any blame either. Most likely, the prospect of losing a well-paying tenant, for real this time, just hit him and he attempted a compromise, too little, too late. Mom was completely fed up and started thinking that maybe the communication problems pertain to this particular landlord and not to everybody. Even the poor teacher felt embarrassed to translate at times. After realizing that she's not changing her mind he switched gears again and started threatening, that she would never find another place, nobody would rent to someone with a dog, and so on and so on.

Surprisingly, mom stayed calm and stuck to her 'it's not you, it's me' tactic. The landlord kept swinging from threats, asking for an extra month's rent AND to keep the deposit, to unconvincing clauses of reconciliation such as "if you change your mind, I am willing to forget about the whole thing".

Long story short, mom is out looking for a new place again...