I am not the Original Poster. OOP is u/GoodSurpriseGoneBad and they posted on r/tifu

Do NOT comment on Original Posts. See rule 7. This sub has a 7-day waiting period so the latest update is at least 7 days old.

Original BORU posted by me August 12, 2023

New Update marked with:

--NEW UPDATE--

TIFU when I 25m learned the language my gf 22 speaks when she gossips with her friends April 5, 2023

This is not my original account.

My gf is South African. Her native language is Afrikaans. I've been learning how to speak Afrikaans without my gf knowing. I secretly applied for online courses that I've been using on and off for more than a year now. My plan was to surprise my gf and her family with my "American Afrikaans" when I finally meet her parents in person for the first time later this year. I never intended to eavesdrop or anything, but learning Afrikaans in secret accidentally exposed me to sensitive information that my gf was sharing on the phone with her Afrikaans speaking friends from South Africa. It was gossip I was not supposed to understand, but eventually I did. This is what I've heard in the past few months:

1. My gf is planning to surprise me on my birthday by reuniting with her high school metal band and putting on a show for me.
2. My gf wants to tattoo the names of literally all the Harry Potter spells on her back, but she doesn't know how to tell me because she's afraid I'll talk her out of it.
3. My gf casually mentioned that one of the unexpected differences between her glasses and her contact lenses is that when she's on her knees looking up at me with her glasses on, my penis looks much bigger compared to what it looks like through her contact lenses, which is why she's keeping her glasses on during sex (ouch).
4. My gf is convinced that my parents are swingers because apparently there are always attractive couples hanging out at my mom and dad's house whenever we visit.
5. My gf secretly finished the entire series of Better Call Saul without me, even though we agreed to finish it together, so now she's pretending to have no idea how the show ends.
6. My gf is thinking about cancelling the high school metal band reunion for my birthday because she's no longer sure if it's appropriate to team up with two of her exes that are original members of the band.
7. My gf expects her dad not to like me.

I would've preferred not knowing most of those things to be honest, but there is no way for me to unlearn Afrikaans, so now I'm cursed with knowing too much while having to pretend I know nothing.

**TL:DR**

I secretly learned my girlfriend's native language as a surprise, but during my learning phase I became capable of understanding what my girlfriend was gossiping about with her friends when she thought I didn't understand. I've come to regret not telling my gf that I was learning her language from the beginning because I know things now that I wish I never knew.

Relevant Comments:

drhunny:

Good thing you're using a burner account to stay anonymous. Otherwise, if she browses the front page of reddit she might get suspicious.

I’m sure there are lots of South African girls out there who are dating American boys and considering getting all of the spells from Harry Potter tattooed on their backs.

Also, just as a side note, there are bloody tons of incantations out there, including such gems as ‘Slugulus Eructo’ and ‘Waddiwasi’.

Global-Cattle-6285:

Ahhh that wasn’t all that bad. Honestly thought this was going to be much worse than it was.

OOP:

Far away from CBAT and nowhere near the Coconut dude, lies my mild fuck up.

TIFUpdate: when I learned the language my gf speaks when she gossips about me with her friends August 5, 2023

The following happened since my orginal post:

1. I asked my gf to marry me in Afrikaans and she said "ja!"
2. I delivered my "I wanna spend the rest of my life with you" speech in Afrikaans, which surprised and impressed my gf, aka my fiancée.
3. As soon as my gf became my fiancée, I casually mentioned that I've secretly been learning her native language and accidentally been eavesdropping on several phone call conversations she had with her Afrikaans speaking friends about things I was not supposed to understand, like, for example, her feeling conflicted about reuniting with her original high school band members for my birthday because the band apparently included two of her exes, or the fact that she wanted to tattoo literally all the Harry Potter spells on her back, or that she finished Better Call Saul without me, or that she thought my mom and dad were swingers, or the real reason why her glasses were always on during sex, or that she's convinced that her dad would hate me, OR some of the stuff she said to her friends after my original post, like how she was struggling to get used to my braces because the braces in my mouth plus the freckles on my face somehow made me look underaged and low key made her feel like she's my older sister when we were out in public.
4. My fiancée was embarrassed when she realized how much Afrikaans I was able to understand and apologized if she made me feel uncomfortable.
5. I accepted her apology, even though it was unnecessary, well, except for finishing Better Call Saul behind my back, that was a playing with fire moment in our relationship, almost unforgivable.
6. My fiancée got one of the Harry Potter spells on her back: erecto patronum. I'm kidding, I stole that from another story. My fiancée is still considering getting her back tattooed. I said it was her choice, but I advised her to avoid covering her entire back with Harry Potter spells like she's some kind of Death Eater Michael Scofield.
7. My fiancée might be right about her dad not liking me because his expression of disappointment and dread when he heard the news of our engagement was priceless. That said, I'll win him over though, even if it kills him (jokes).
8. My fiancée fully believes my parents are swingers based on the different couples she's occasionally observed coming and going whenever we visited my mom and dad. She wants us to investigate my parents because for some reason it's fun for her to imagine me being the son of a mom and dad whose sex life is far more kinky than mine. I'm not interested in opening that door though because I don't wanna know what goes on in my mom and dad's bedroom. However, something tells me that my fiancée will not rest until she has all the answers.
9. I made it clear to my fiancée that I had no problem with her reuniting with her high school band to perform at my birthday, unless it was uncomfortable for her that her exes were part of the band. My fiancée ultimately decided to cancel the band because of behind the scenes drama. The drummer, who was one of the exes, apparently gained a lot of weight after high school and lost all confidence to perform in the band. The lead guitarist, aka the other ex, was only willing to participate if my fiancée agreed to play covers of gospel songs since he was now saved and no longer interested in playing "the devil's music." The bass guitarist wanted money.
10. My fiancée still wears her glasses during sex.

TL:DR I came clean about understanding Afrikaans and now my gf and I are engaged. You'll have to read the post if you want more information because I can't sum up months of updates in a couple of lines.

Edit: To all the comments saying this is a repost, it's not. It's an update of my original post from a few months ago. Check my history. It's my story.

Relevant Comments:

Vordeo:

We won't have closure until we find out whether or not OP's parents are swingers. Who presumably talk dirty to their swing partners in Afrikaans.

OOP:

I refuse to believe that my parents are swingers. My future South African father in law already thinks Americans are weird, so hopefully my mom and dad can prove that some of us are actually ordinary people.

--NEW UPDATE--

TIFUpdate: when I learned the language my gf speaks when she gossips with her friends December 30, 2024

Last time I was here, I shared an update related to my original post, but I deleted that update because I was keen to tell the internet, aka all of you, that my gf and I got engaged. However, since then, we've not only gotten ourselves un-engaged, we've actually broken up. In my original post, my ex gf, who was still my gf back then, had a wild theory that my mom and dad were swingers just because they always had people at their house. I never believed it, but I thought it was hilarious that someone thought my parents were that interesting.

Not gonna lie, I struggled to move on after my relationship ended. My apartment had too many memories of my ex, so I called my parents to ask if I could stay with them for a bit, just to clear my head. My parents said yes. My dad offered to pick me up, which I accepted. What should have been a 10 minute drive unexpectedly turned into a 45 minute drive because my dad decided to take the longer route back to his house. When my dad was done making dad jokes to help me get over my break up, he started doing that weird dad thing where he's trying to bring up an awkward topic, but it's too uncomfortable for him to just spit it out, so he ends up saying a bunch of words that only he understands.

I was forced to interrupt my dad and basically beg him to make sense. My dad said since it was unclear how long I was gonna stay, he felt compelled to prepare me for what I might see at the house. If my ex was present at that moment, she would have punched me on my shoulder and said "I fucking told you!" because my dad confirmed her swinger theory, which no longer made it a theory, but the truth, or as I liked to call it, trauma. By the time my dad and I finally made it to our destination, my dad made sure I knew everything I needed to know. I made a list based on what I learned from my dad.

1. Both my parents were swingers when they met.
2. Swinging was not something my parents wanted to do while raising kids, so swinging was prohibited when my parents became parents.
3. To see if they "still got it", my parents switched back to swinging when they had the house to themselves again, and lo and behold, they still got it.
4. Hosting swinger parties was something my parents did frequently, usually with themes.
5. My parents were planning to host another swinger party, but my mom was leaning towards calling it off so that I could come home and stay for as long as I wanted.
6. If my parents were forced to cancel, it woud be the first swinger party they called off since Covid.
7. The theme was "prom night."

I never expected my dad to go that hard in the too much information category, but as soon as he crossed that threshold, he got it all out of his system. I stayed with my parents for a total of two days before it became abundantly clear to me that knowledge might be power for some people, but for me, knowledge was fucking punishment. My mom, who was unaware that I low key knew she was swinger mom, attempted to convince me to stay longer, and she almost succeeded, but I was done with my dad using our father son bonding time to play guess which one of our neighbours are also swingers. I used an Uber to get back to my apartment. No more dad rides. I've never been so happy to return to a place that was haunted by my failed relationship.

TL:DR

Relationship ended. Didn't wanna be alone. Called my parents. Asked if I could stay with them. They said yes. Dad offered to pick me up. During the drive, dad decided to tell me that him and my mom were swingers and kind of implied that I was fucking up their plans by unexpectedly coming over to be sad and shit. I returned to my apartment 2 days later with unwanted mental pictures of my parents fucking random people.

Relevant Comments:

Why OOP broke up with his ex:

My ex and I broke up because of a tattoo. Her friend passed away, which prompted her to literally get his name tattooed on the back of her neck. The friend was someone my ex used to sleep with before she met me. I made it clear to her, prior to the tattoo, that I understood that it was her body to do with whatever she wanted, but as someone who was prepared to be with her forever, it was gonna be uncomfortable for me to see another guy's name on her body for the rest of our lives, especially the name of a dead guy she had casual sex with. My ex got the tattoo anyway. The tattoo was small and barely visible. That was her defence. I knew it was there. That was enough. It was also very fucking visible in the doggy style position (sorry for the TMI). We argued about the tattoo until we eventually said enough hurtful things that could never be unsaid. Clearly, the tattoo was worth losing me because the tattoo is still there, and I'm not.

Second-Creative:

"I can't stay here. Too many sad memories."

two days later

"SAVE ME FROM THE HORRIBLE THINGS I NOW KNOW, SAD MEMORIES!"

OOP:

I would gladly relive the pain of my relationship getting napalmed, then listening to my dad make up synonyms for swingers like "nono monogamo."

dwhelen:

Wow. Wow wow wow.

I truly wasn't expecting THAT update, but as I started reading I saw it coming.

They're adults, respect their choices, but I can understand the trauma from it. Good luck to you coming to terms with both issues, my dude!

OOP:

Yeah, I'm in no position to judge my parents, even though I'm doing it automatically, I can't help it, but I do respect their choices, regardless if it leaves me mentally scarred for the rest of my life.

TIFUpdate 2: when I learned the language my gf speaks when she gossips with her friends January 6, 2025 (wayback)

In a moment of weakness, I sent my ex gf a message to tell her that she was right about my parents being swingers. She responded with an excessive amount of reaction gifs before calling me all the way from South Africa for more information. It was my first time talking to her since our break up, so naturally I was kind of awkward when I answered the phone. Instead of saying hello like a normal human being, I greeted my ex in her own language by saying "awe jou ma se poes", which in Afrikaans translated to "hi your mother's cunt." It was an accident. A slip of the tongue. I was going for "awe my ma se kind", which is another way of greeting someone that you know very well, but I accidentally got my Afrikaans slang mixed up and unfortunately said something that would offend most South Africans.

I used the correct Afrikaans words afterwards with an apology for the unintentional insult. My ex only accepted my apology after she made me translate my "I'm sorry for calling you a cunt" into Afrikaans. I eventually explained to my ex how I found out my parents were swingers, which basically boiled down to my dad telling me everything. When my ex was finally satisfied with the amount of times she said "I fucking told you so", she reminded me of all the clues that made her suspect my parents of being swingers since the beginning. I'll list all the clues she mentioned.

1. My parents had extra toothbrushes in their bathroom.
2. My dad had a coffee mug that said "married with benefits."
3. Attractive couples were always leaving the house whenever we were visiting my parents.
4. When my ex and I were still together, she apparently asked my mom what her secret was for loving the same person for so long, and according to my ex, my mom said the secret was "spreading the love."
5. My parents served us leftover pineapple cake during one of our visits.

I disagreed with my ex about number 5 because I never had pineapple cake in my life. My ex said I definitely had pineapple cake in my life because she was literally in my life when I ate it. I asked her if she felt like adding a random pineapple reference just for the sake of including a pineapple somewhere. My ex, who was now sounding annoyed, said she was more than willing to call my mom to not only verify the pineapple cake, but also everything else that she filed under "clues." I informed my ex that my mom most likely had no idea that my dad told me about their swinger life, so it would not be wise to call my parents. My ex said the pineapple cake happened.

For my own protection, I said nothing, which somehow made it worse. My ex pointed out that she was still in our family group chat, so she might end up using that as a platform to ask my parents if they remembered us eating pineapple cake. I totally forgot about the family group because none of my family members actually used it, but I did check, and my ex was right, she was still part of the group, and she made sure I understood that she wanted to continue being part of the group, and if I removed her, then she might decide to make that call to my parents that I wanted her not to make.

Now my butthole clenches every time I get a notification on my phone because I think, here we go, incoming message in the family group from my crazy ex about the fucking pineapple cake.

TL:DR

Informed my ex gf that she was right about my parents being swingers, which ended up with the two of us arguing about a pineapple cake that she believed my parents apparently made us eat. Now I fear that my ex might get my parents involved to prove me wrong and convince me that there was in fact a pineapple cake.

Relevant Comments:

fargerich:

Dude, you are a drama queen. Learn to take a dip and accept she was right, stop taking offense for every single little detail. You'll be a happier man in the long run.

She seems to be fucking with you at this point, and I'd say your relationship is over. She dodged the bullet.

Learn from what happened and stop taking yourself and everything so seriously.

hannanist:

Wild story, but what bemuses me the most is this:  After listing every single thing that she listed that she was right about, that you would argue with her about the pineapple cake, even though by you telling this story here, it's clear that she is sharp and observant. 

I know I'm extrapolating here some, but it sounds like she constantly had to try to tell you things and you rigidly stood by your opinion no matter what. 

Here you go doing it again, no wonder she is fucking with you by teasing you with asking your mom. 

This type of stubborn disbelief and refusal to accept that someone else's observations and deductions could be correct  are a great way to lose partners and friends. 

Doubling down to continue doing the same after baiting the argument by apologizing for not believing her (you did do that, right?) is an extra level of facepalm, respectfully. 

We can help ourselves become less rigid with therapy. I'm still working on this shit. Trust me you do not want to grow into an old completely rigid person who can't listen to or trust other people's observations. I've seen plenty of old people this way and they're all lonely. 

akillerofjoy:

So, to summarize, you call your ex, you say hello with one of the most vile lines you could possibly say in Afrikaans, and the entire purpose of that call was to gossip about some business that has nothing to do with either one of you. Then, you decide that the value of that pointless conversation is so high that it must be shared with the rest of the world, and you take it to Reddit.

Cool.

I don’t know how I’ve been living without knowing what your dad’s favorite mug says on it.

spudsbottom:

Why would you even tell her? Why is she still in the family chat? Why even bother arguing? This whole interaction is weird as hell, and the situation in general comes across as creative writing.

Reminder: I am not OOP. Do NOT comment on Original Posts. No Brigading! See Rule 7.