I've always been intrigued by words: their meaning, origin, spelling, etc. I've taken classes in American Sign Language, Spanish, French and even a little Mandarin Chinese. It's interesting how separately these letters are meaningless but bound together can conjure up so many different images and feelings. We grow up learning "sticks and stones can break my bones but words will never hurt me" but we all know words can be very powerful. However, words can only have the meaning and power you assign to them.
Our family increased by one a little over a month ago when a French exchange student, hereby known as "Frenchie", came to live with us for the school year. His main goal in coming to the US is to improve his English so that he can get into an engineering flight school. Most of the time it is not difficult to communicate with him as he speaks English fairly well. However, it also often gives us much amusement.
One of the funniest language confusions was when he asked us "who's your Christmas Daddy"? Huh? It took some more questioning to realize he meant Santa Claus! In France, he is known as Pere Noel (Father Christmas) so he translated it quite literally. I kinda like Christmas Daddy myself.
Another common language error he makes is using pronouns he or she for objects. If you've ever taken a foreign language, such as French or Spanish, you know that unlike English, all objects have a masculine or feminine designation. While we do correct him because his goal is to improve his language skills, I've grown fond of thinking of objects as possessing male or female attributes. Last night Frenchie was looking for an apple in the bin, and he tells me "there is one . . .but she is dead". Isn't that much more descriptive and romantic sounding than "it's rotten"?
He is quickly becoming an American teenager. He joined the high school football team, despite never having played nor even watched a game. He has discovered the joy of peanut butter, apple pie and Dr. Pepper. He is even a Homecoming Prince and will go to his first school dance this weekend. We've taken him to Walmart, a college football game (Ducks, of course), Rocky Horror Picture Show and in December we're going to Las Vegas. We're giving him the complete American Experience. I encourage anyone who has a little extra room to invite one of these kids into your home. It's a great adventure.
And speaking of words, November 1st is NaNoWriMo Thousands sign up for this yearly challenge to write a 50,000 word rough draft of a novel. I've toyed with the idea for years but not quite sure I'm ready to take the plunge. If you're interested, check it out. There's probably a group near you. Oh yeah, don't forget to turn your clocks back this weekend too.
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