As mentioned in my last post, being an alien in another country and language, I have some idea of what it is like to handicapped by a limited vocabulary. But what is it like to have an incomplete grasp of your own native language?
Last year, while on her quest to get into further studies (a quest that is ongoing by the way) one brave and fiesty orphan spent a whole day wandering around the city, asking everyone she met how she could find the POLITIKA on Boriseva. When she finally returned home, unsuccessful, and explained how she had spent her time, we had to point out to her that there is no such building as the POLITIKA.
“What you were looking for is called a POLYCLINIC {local-speak for a medical clinic}”
In all her 18 years of living, she had never heard this common word before, but had latched on to the familiar sounds in the word and come up with politika! (Unfortunately for her, there is also no street ‘Boriseva’ – she had misheard Mariseva!)
More recently, this past summer, little G came home from her first day at her new work.
“How is it?” we asked.
“Good” she said, “but I want to work at a bank.”
My colleague and I exchanged confused looks. A bank? Where did that come from?
“What do you mean?” we probed “What’s wrong with the restaurant?”
It was time for a confused look on little G’s face.
“Nothing. I just want to work at a bank there.”…
Confusion reigned for several more minutes before the issue was resolved.
“Ohhhhhh! A BANKET!” we finally intuited. “You want to work at a banquet”.
“Yes – that’s what I said! A bank!”
Imagine how completely confuddled and befused she was when a few weeks later she was introduced to the BANKOMAT (local-speak for ATM)! Poor girl. I still don't think she really has those three words straight!
Sunday 29 January 2012
Monday 16 January 2012
"Hussein says"... a great way to learn Russian verbs
Some of my best russian lessons have been had while watching, waiting and often participating in the fixing of bumps, bangs, scrapes and general wear and tear of Nadya the LADA and Freddy the VW.
Back in Nadya's day there was the time we were having her brakes seen to. I was in the hoisted up car (not so unusual here), being commanded by a guy named Hussein (quite unusual for here, hence why I remember his name) and was responsible for pressing, holding, pumping and letting go of the brake pedal. They say total physical response is a great way to learn a language, especially verbs, and I would have to agree. I think however, that the words might not have stuck so well, if it wasn't for the fact that I was then able to use 3 of the 4 of them in teaching computer skills to our Tumdi 9th graders.
Before that fun hour spent in a barely heated, dimly lit, exhaust and smoke-filled garage, pressing, holding, and letting go of the brake pedal, I had resorted to a lot of sound effects in my first efforts to teach basic mouse manipulation skills to computer illiterate teens who gripped those mouse-s with steel trap-like grips.
"Just {click} this button once. No {click}. No! Make it sound like this! {click}"
"Ok, to make this window bigger, first you need to {click} but keep it {cliccckkkkkkked}..."
Nope. There's just no way to make a "press and hold" sound with you tongue. I didn't even get to the "let go of the button" sound. The kids were probably just as frustrated as I was. Perhaps they should be called sound in-effects!
However, after repeated reinforcement with Hussein and the brake pedal, I was a master at these 3 russian verbs.
"Just press once. Good"
"Ok, now press and hold,... good, and now let go."
Ahhh,.... the victory of using words... now I know what a talking toddler feels like!
It's just a shame that all my car mechanic words can't be as useful. Thanks to a recent adventure with the gas pedal on Freddy, I learnt the russian word for throttle - for the space of about a week. At the time, I checked my online dictionary and found that unfortunately I can't use it to say to little G, or any other graduate who is acting up: "I could throttle you!!!" (lovingly of course)
Pity. I suspect it would have been a helpful way to reinforce my new vocab addition. Instead, the word has been relegated to the "might recognize it, but can't reproduce it" drawer of my brain.
Back in Nadya's day there was the time we were having her brakes seen to. I was in the hoisted up car (not so unusual here), being commanded by a guy named Hussein (quite unusual for here, hence why I remember his name) and was responsible for pressing, holding, pumping and letting go of the brake pedal. They say total physical response is a great way to learn a language, especially verbs, and I would have to agree. I think however, that the words might not have stuck so well, if it wasn't for the fact that I was then able to use 3 of the 4 of them in teaching computer skills to our Tumdi 9th graders.
Before that fun hour spent in a barely heated, dimly lit, exhaust and smoke-filled garage, pressing, holding, and letting go of the brake pedal, I had resorted to a lot of sound effects in my first efforts to teach basic mouse manipulation skills to computer illiterate teens who gripped those mouse-s with steel trap-like grips.
"Just {click} this button once. No {click}. No! Make it sound like this! {click}"
"Ok, to make this window bigger, first you need to {click} but keep it {cliccckkkkkkked}..."
Nope. There's just no way to make a "press and hold" sound with you tongue. I didn't even get to the "let go of the button" sound. The kids were probably just as frustrated as I was. Perhaps they should be called sound in-effects!
However, after repeated reinforcement with Hussein and the brake pedal, I was a master at these 3 russian verbs.
"Just press once. Good"
"Ok, now press and hold,... good, and now let go."
Ahhh,.... the victory of using words... now I know what a talking toddler feels like!
It's just a shame that all my car mechanic words can't be as useful. Thanks to a recent adventure with the gas pedal on Freddy, I learnt the russian word for throttle - for the space of about a week. At the time, I checked my online dictionary and found that unfortunately I can't use it to say to little G, or any other graduate who is acting up: "I could throttle you!!!" (lovingly of course)
Pity. I suspect it would have been a helpful way to reinforce my new vocab addition. Instead, the word has been relegated to the "might recognize it, but can't reproduce it" drawer of my brain.
Sunday 1 January 2012
Will I still be an orphan if...?
“If I find my parents, will I still be an orphan?” Little G looked at me with her big, baby seal-like eyes and waited. What a question! Obviously something that she has given a lot of thought to lately.
Like most of the other orphanage graduates I have talked with, her conversations often return to the subject of finding her parents, or more specifically, her mother. They all come out with the same line: “If I found my mother, I wouldn’t want to live with her, even if she was rich. I just want to see who she is, what she looks like, and to ask her: Why did you leave me? But, if she was poor and in trouble, I would help her.”
Today, however, was the first time I had heard this more philosophical line of thinking on the subject of absent parents. Did she mean in the eyes of the law? in her eyes? in the eyes of the community around her?
Little G filled in my silence with some of her own reflections. “I grew up in an orphanage, so I guess I will always be детдомский. And after all, Kenji has a mother, but she’s still detdomskii…”
Her thoughts are no doubt influenced by her new life living around ‘normal’ people – people with family, people with education, people with ‘upbringing’, and people with a misguided and unexecuted insistence, almost as soon as they meet our girls, that they can help them find their parents.
Identity, belonging and worth – core issues we all wrestle with to some degree or another. How much more for one abandoned at birth? As I was confronted by little G’s desperate need to hear the perfect answer, I was even more convinced that these issues cannot be completely addressed by any human act, no matter how well intentioned or perfectly executed.
Like most of the other orphanage graduates I have talked with, her conversations often return to the subject of finding her parents, or more specifically, her mother. They all come out with the same line: “If I found my mother, I wouldn’t want to live with her, even if she was rich. I just want to see who she is, what she looks like, and to ask her: Why did you leave me? But, if she was poor and in trouble, I would help her.”
Today, however, was the first time I had heard this more philosophical line of thinking on the subject of absent parents. Did she mean in the eyes of the law? in her eyes? in the eyes of the community around her?
Little G filled in my silence with some of her own reflections. “I grew up in an orphanage, so I guess I will always be детдомский. And after all, Kenji has a mother, but she’s still detdomskii…”
Her thoughts are no doubt influenced by her new life living around ‘normal’ people – people with family, people with education, people with ‘upbringing’, and people with a misguided and unexecuted insistence, almost as soon as they meet our girls, that they can help them find their parents.
Identity, belonging and worth – core issues we all wrestle with to some degree or another. How much more for one abandoned at birth? As I was confronted by little G’s desperate need to hear the perfect answer, I was even more convinced that these issues cannot be completely addressed by any human act, no matter how well intentioned or perfectly executed.
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