Global Cleveland

Today in a downtown drugstore an elderly Indian man with jet black hair--white at the roots-- was buying a box of hair dye and other sundries. The check-out clerk rings him up and then leans over to the clerk who was ringing me out and asks, "you have his coupons?". My clerk glances at his purchases and then ruffles through a stack of coupons and hands over two.

His clerk announces in a loud voice apparently reserved for those who don't speak English well, "you saved ten dollars". The Indian man raises his eyebrows, smiles, and starts fumbling with the gum at the counter. He hurriedly grabs 3 packs of orange Trident and adds it to his purchases.

He pays and gives a pack of gum to each clerk in gratitude. "For you, for you, for me," he says.

My clerk looks at me and explains, "I always keep his coupons for him. He never remembers to bring them. He's been coming here for years. He doesn't understand much English, but he understands ten dollars."