Life with Suzie - Man-speak Part 2

A while ago I wrote about the secret language of men, "man-speak". For the unenlightened it is the ability of a man to hold a conversation with monosyllables, grunts and other non-vebal forms of communication, which most men understand perfectly well, but which inevetably drive a woman mad.

My Suzie is a warm, friendly and gregarious person, who has never been able to grasp the fundamentals of "man-speak".

On our last trip to the Addo Elephant National Park we stayed overnight and rose early to look for the lions. We drove to the place where they were last spotted, but as luck would have it we saw everything but lions.

Then along came a ray of light - a game viewing vehicle. Suzie was quick to flag it down and very cheerfully said, "Good morning, have you by any chance spotted any lions."

The young man looked at her, pushed out his lower lip and then shook his head, once to the right and once to the left and unceremoniously drove off.

"How rude," she said, "I can see why he became a game ranger and chose to work with animals."

I laughed. "Man-speak," I said, "he has just told you that he has not seen any lions, despite having got up early and driven all over the park looking for them. He is also very disappointed that he has let his clients down."

"Yeah, right," she responded.


We carried on and about an hour and a half later, we saw the same vehicle coming towards us. This time the young man gave us a lopsided grin and a half-hearted wave.

Before Suzie could say anything, I said, "There you go, the two of you are now friends."

"How is that possible," she asked.

"He obviously enjoyed his last conversation with you," I said.