Come Now! Come Now!

Funny story…Anna got a $25 Visa card from one of her friends for her 13th birthday.  She wanted to spend it on a manicure before she left for camp.  She has never had a manicure and has always wondered what it would be like.  I called a nail salon the afternoon of the 4th of July and was surprised when they answered.  I asked how late they would be open that day.  I got the impression that things were slow in the salon and that they were considering closing early, so I asked them if they would be closing soon.  I figured I would just schedule an appointment for the next morning if that were the case, but she hurriedly shot back at me in a heavy Vietnamese accent, “No, come now! Come now!”  I think I commented that I could schedule something for the morning, but she insisted, “Come now!  Come now!”  She said she would tell her employees to wait for me and insisted that I “Come now!”  I got off the phone and told Anna that we must hastily “Come now!” (said in my best Vietnamese accent”).  We laughed as we scrambled to put on our shoes.  When we pulled into the salon’s parking lot, we saw one Vietnamese man and one Vietnamese lady walking out of the shop.  They were walking to their car (the only car in the parking lot).  I looked at Anna and commented that this didn’t look good.  We walked up to the salon doors, and they were, as suspected, locked.  I walked up to their vehicle and said, “Excuse me, ma’am” because they had their heads crouched down doing something in the backseat of their vehicle and didn’t appear as if they were planning on coming out of there while we were still there.  I told her I had just called about getting a basic gel manicure and was told to come in now.  She said to me in her thick accent, “Yes, I wait 15 minutes, and I wanna go home.”  I said something like, “Well, I wish I would have been told that then when I called and was told to come in now.”  She just sort of shrugged and said, “I wait 15 minutes.  I wanna go home.”  Did they think I lived right next door and could just pop right over??  Then she asked me if it was the both of us that wanted a manicure, and I told her that it would just be my daughter.  I think she expected me to say the both of us, and when I didn’t her plan to say that it would take too long backfired because she hesitated as she thought a moment but then stood her ground with a, “I wait 15 minutes.  I wanna go home.”  So then I did the absurd when put in those awkward situations and still want to respond in a Christ-like manner…I said, “Okay.  Thank you.”  As I walked back to my car, I looked at Anna and mouthed “Thank you???”  What was I thanking her for???  We laughed about it all the way home!!  The next day Anna did get her manicure,  but we went to another location and had such amazing customer service.  They were fun and even took $10 off Anna’s manicure because they were running a little bit behind.  We would definitely go back to them!