When English isn’t your first language and you find yourself in a country where it’s primarily spoken, there are words that no textbook will ever teach you. I will never forget the first English word I learned when I came to Canada.
Two years ago, while working my first job as a hotel receptionist, I received a call from a guest asking for someone to bring a “plunger” to their room. I had no idea what a plunger was, but based on the phonetics, I confidently replied, “Sure, we’ll get you a plunger,” and then immediately turned to my coworker and asked, “What is a plunger?”
At the beginning of this year, in a different hotel but still at the reception desk, I learned, thanks to another guest, that “plunger” can also be a verb: “plunging.”
Like I said, not everything is in the boo
