Retell the story in 4 or 5 sentences.
During his first week as a site engineer in Brisbane, Thanh realised that his university English hadn't prepared him for the conversations on site.
At the morning toolbox meeting, the foreman ran through the day's jobs at remarkable speed. "Righto, we'll knock off the formwork on level two before smoko, then the sparkies are in this arvo, so keep the walkways clear."
Thanh nodded as if he understood, but he had caught perhaps half of it. Later, he made a mistake that cost the team an hour: he hadn't realised that 'sparkies' meant electricians.
Embarrassed, he considered saying nothing. Instead, he approached the foreman at lunch. "Mate, can I ask you something? Some of the slang goes straight over my head. Would you mind slowing down a bit in the meetings?"
To his surprise, the foreman laughed warmly. "Course! Half the young blokes don't know what I'm on about either. Just stop me when I lose you."
From then on, Thanh kept a list in his phone: tradie terms, shortened words and phrases like 'she'll be right'. Within a couple of months, he was the one explaining them to new arrivals.
Looking back, he says the most valuable phrase he learned that year wasn't technical at all. It was simply: "Sorry, can you run that by me again?"