I once had an older next-door neighbor named Pedro who did not speak English.
I knew a bit of Spanish from high school, so we managed to communicate using the few words of English that he knew and my limited Spanish.
A few words came naturally. When I said “Quiero una cerveza”, Pedro would smile and soon we would be sharing a few beers as we “talked” about almost anything. I admit I had an ulterior motive because I was in my late 20s and Pedro’s daughter Aina was quite attractive. She spoke perfect English, but I was too shy to approach her and I feared Pedro might not approve. My “plan” to win Aina was hatched when Pedro complained that his “aire acondicionado” was not working properly. I happened to be a certified HVAC technician, so I offered my help to figure out what the problem was. I waited until Aina was there and we began to inspect his system. I explained how he needed to recharge the system with refrigerant, replace a broken fan blade, and give his HVAC system a much-needed cleaning and maintenance tune-up. I deliberately spoke extremely fast and I could see that Pedro was getting frustrated because he did not understand my words. Finally, he said, “Aina, por favor ven aqui” and she stepped in as our interpreter. I finally got the courage to ask her to have dinner with me. Pedro asked her ¿Que dijo el?. Aina replied ¿Podemos cenar? Pedro frowned and then said “Si, Si” but unfortunately Aina was already spoken for. Pedro sensed that his free HVAC service was in jeopardy, so he quickly said, “Mi sobrina vendrá pronto.” His niece was even prettier than Aina.