'¿Qué Tal, Amigo?' Says Colleague Who Thinks You’re Colombian

BROOKLYN, NY—In a charming effort to bring some friendliness back to the office as companies begin to encouragers their workers to return to the commute, your colleague Brad has reached out with a friendly, “¿Qué Tal?”, even though you are not Colombian, have never been Colombian, and are from a completely different part of the world.

Brad, who repeatedly brings up how much his daughter loves Olivia Rodrigo (also not Colombian) in your presence, has insisted on greeting you like this every day for the past two weeks. You’re pretty sure that you remember that your fun ice-breaker in the game they made you play when you got hired was that your mom is Burmese and your dad is German, which is quite possibly the furthest from Colombian you could possibly be, but this has not stopped Brad. It will never stop Brad.

In fact, upon coming back from lunch yesterday, Brad sought you out to Slack you how he’d heard there’s a lot of good Latin food in Bushwick but he’d love a second opinion, which he seemingly thought was a further deepening of your workplace friendship. Sadly, it was not, and you were eating half of a leftover Potbelly sub at the time.

Brad, who is also insistent that his other daughter cannot stop talking about Ariana Grande (Italian, you think???), is also just high enough up in the company that you normally respond to his “¿Qué Tal?” with a “Not much, not much, man.” However, in the current climate, Brad is dedicated to changing and growing. Tomorrow, he will come in with a cheery “Ni Hao!”. You are also not Chinese.