The other week I checked in with a group of residents at the resthome and my one (older) (blocky-built) (Tibetan) coworker was there, and I asked them if they wanted coffee or tea or juice or anything, which they didn't.
"Maybe barley tea?", I was like, joking with my one (Tibetan) coworker, but she looked confused and was like, "I don't drink barley tea," and then I realized that I had said the wrong thing and so I was like, "Oh, I didn't mean barley tea, I meant tea with barley flour, do you want tea with barley flour?".
"Oh, you can get that?", she was like, and when I said no, that I was just joking, she laughed.
She then said that all her life she drinks tea with barley flour, that's it, no alcohol, and that one time back in India all her friends were at her house drinking wine, and all night she just drank tea with barley flour, and she ended up cooking for them and cleaning all night and doing everything, while they just sat there and drank wine. "But I don't drink wine, nooo," she was like.
A little bit later in that same conversation, she asked me to explain what "neither" was.
It was surprisingly difficult to explain.
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