Day 39: Did We Ever Choose This Job?
On a late shift at a software company in Monterrey, Abdiel (A), a programmer, and Fátima (B), a data analyst, are waiting for a stuck deployment to go through.
How to study this lesson 3 steps
- Read the situation under the title. It says who is talking and how they know each other, which decides how politely they speak.
- Read the dialogue line by line with its translation, until every line makes sense. Point at (or tap) a Spanish word to see what it means.
- Spend at least 30 minutes listening to native Spanish, for example from the Resources page. It doesn't matter if you don't understand it yet.
Dialogue
Audio recordings are on the way. For now, each lesson is the dialogue with its English translation.
Keys: E hide English · ← → previous / next day · point at a word to see its meaning
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A
Dos de la mañana y el deploy trabado. ¿De veras escogiste esta vida, o te fue llevando la corriente?
Two in the morning and the deploy stuck. Did you really choose this life, or did the current just carry you along?
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B
Claro que sí: en la prepa el test vocacional arrojó “ciencias exactas”, con todo y gráfica de pastel.
Of course I did: in high school the career test came out with “exact sciences,” pie chart and all.
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A
¿A eso le llamas escoger? El hecho de que cuarenta preguntas decidan tu vida es determinismo de opción múltiple.
You call that choosing? The fact that forty questions decide your life is multiple-choice determinism.
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B
No me vengas con Spinoza: nos creemos libres porque ignoramos las causas. Pero el test lo contesté yo.
Don't come at me with Spinoza: we think we're free because we don't know the causes. But I'm the one who answered the test.
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A
Yo estudié Sistemas porque en mi casa todos son ingenieros. Ahí el que uno elija otra cosa es traición.
I studied computer science because everyone in my family is an engineer. There, choosing anything else is betrayal.
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B
Correlación no implica causalidad: tu familia de ingenieros no prueba que no hayas elegido. ¿A qué viene esto?
Correlation doesn't imply causation: your family of engineers doesn't prove you didn't choose. What brought this on?
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A
Es que vengo pensando en renunciar desde enero. Ando buscando plaza de maestro de matemáticas en una secundaria.
It's just that I've been thinking of quitting since January. I've been looking for a job as a math teacher at a middle school.
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B
¿Tú, con treinta morros de secundaria? Con ese sueldo no pagas ni la mensualidad del carro.
You, with thirty middle-school kids? On that salary you won't even cover the car payments.
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A
Vendo el carro y me muevo en Metrorrey. Lo que no sé es si lo quiero o si ando huyendo del teclado.
I'll sell the car and get around on the Metrorrey. What I don't know is whether I want it or whether I'm running away from the keyboard.
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B
Sartre diría que estás condenado a ser libre. Pero esta noche estás condenado al deploy.
Sartre would say you're condemned to be free. But tonight you're condemned to the deploy.
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