“Los Zapaticos de Rosa” in ingles. No guay
Maria asked me to read “Los Zapaticos de Rosa”…in English.
“Can’t, Ma. It’s a poem. Have to read it in Spanish.”
“But, then I can’t understand it!”
“Look at the pictures and I will translate as we go.”
“But, I can’t understand!”
“Just listen to the rhythm and keep your ears open, you’ll get it.”
“OK, but then you have to read it in English, please.”
It is not possible at all to capture the lyricism of the Cuban poet’s Los Zapaticos in my choppy translation. “And so the girl and her mom walked toward the beach.” “And a Russian woman and an English woman pulled out their hankies…”
I have known this poem since I was a little girl, and it feels like sacrilege to read it in English.
The translation showdown between my daughter and I pretty much sums up what is going on with our Spanish, our quest for bilingualism. It is slow. It is choppy. She gets the simple sentences, and her teacher insists she understands everything he says, but when we read Spanish books together, the complex sentences seem to basically just piss her the hell off. She wants to get it, but she doesn’t want to do the work.
She’ll grab a Spanish book off her shelf, but attempt to bribe me into reading it only in English. No guay, I tell her. Both. She doesn’t like it when I read in Spanish, and then quickly translate it to English. She wants it all in one language at a time.
My fault, for sure. I speak more English than Spanish to her these days, and when we hang with other bilingual Latinos, guess what language we speak? Jes. Ingles.
I am figuring out how to survive this downward spiral, wondering how to give her a boost this summer. Maybe it will be Miami for an extended period, or I may have to invite myself to Mexico with friends who head south of the border for weeks and weeks every summer.
Or maybe I just have to speak more Spanish to her. There’s a thought.
From Los Zapaticos de Rosa by Jose Marti:
Se vio sacar los pañuelos
A una rusa y a una inglesa;
El aya de la francesa
Se quitó los espejuelos.
Abrió la madre los brazos,
Se echó Pilar en su pecho,
Y sacó el traje deshecho,
Sin adornos y sin lazos
And by the way, the first Blogs by Latinas Awards are going on now. Bilingual in the Boonies and Tiki Tiki Blog, my other blog, are nominated. I’d love the vote! Street Cred and all.
Plus, there are some awesome sites nominated. Go look, find some gems, and vote.
Mi nena is much the same. She says many many words and small phrases in Spanish. She understands a lot more, but answers in English most of the time. When I read an entire book to her in Spanish, I see that there’s some sort of disconnect going on and most of the time end up translating a little. We “discuss” the book in English, even if we read the words in Spanish.
I too need to work on speaking lots more Spanish to her. But, I feel good that at the very least…she’s gaining an appreciation for half of her culture.
.-= Melanie (ModernMami)´s last blog ..Do You Work Weekends or Unplug? =-.
Mandamela 2 meses para Miami y veras que rapido habla mejor el español,que maravilla!
Ya he votado por tu blog, Carrie. Go Boonies!
Suerte
Raul
A veces tenemos el mismo problema con nuestro chiquirín. (El hijo mayor tiene un acento tan fuerte, pero le gusta hablar español.) … Pero, el chiquirín se pone fustrado cuando hablamos en español porque le cuesta entenderlo.
¿Qué podemos hacer? Sigue, sigue, tratando y un día, ójala, van a estar agradecidos.
(¡Ya he votado por tus blogs, también! Buena suerte!)
.-= Sra. López´s last blog ..I have a voice and I will not be silenced =-.
Melanie, maybe we both should send our kids to their Abuelitas?
Raul, gracias…and Sra, your espanish is so fabulous!
And thanks for the votes everybody!
Good thing you only can vote once or Abuelita, up there, would be in there voting a hundred times…she is a proud mama.
It drives me crazy if my kids don’t want to read something in Spanish. But if I make it funny, they will go along. I understand what you mean!
Carrie,
Stay strong! No te rindas! What you describe is something I’ve been fearing will happen with my kids (who are younger than yours), so in a self-centered sort of way, I need you to succeed.
I am no linguist but I bet that in the worst case-scenario, Maria’s brain is already so fully wired for bilingualism, that if she refuses to speak Spanish for the next 10 years, when she gets to college and re-discovers how cool her roots make her, she’ll be speaking Spanish como una lora.
Take care and thanks as always for sharing.
Rubén
Carrie,
if you can, definitely take her somewhere where only Spanish will be spoken. My daughter is also bilingual and she also prefers English to Russian. We mostly speak Russian at home but she prefers English anyway. However when we go visit our family, 2 weeks in a Russian-speaking setting is all it takes her to get such a boost in Russian. It is simply amazing!
I ran into the same problem with my daughter preferring English stories over German. We came up with a few compromises: First, on school days she picks the story, but on weekends I get to pick (and I almost always pick German ones).
Second, I read in the language it’s printed in. Period. When it’s a new story, I go back and explain it in English, but only the first few times.
And finally, when she asks me what the story says in English, I ask her what she thinks it says, and let her use the pictures (and her own translations of what she’s been hearing me say) to tell the story back to me. It’s amazing how accurately she can describe the story!
Devon´s last essay ..Six Weeks Left?!
I think my mom fought the same battle with me. Surrounded by so much English (we moved to the states when I was 4), we just succumbed to the language. However, I think the smartest thing she did was send me to Puerto Rico for the summers… every summer… until I was about 13.
If I didn’t learn Spanish, I wasn’t going to get fed. ;) My grandmother didn’t speak English, so it was up to me to make sure we could communicate.
I think the summer immersion really kickstarted my love of languages. I discovered that I really liked being able to switch back and forth between languages. Maybe there’s something similar you can do for your nena.
Oh – and while my mom speaks English really well, I plan on asking her to only speak Spanish to my little girl when it’s time. If I went through it and came out on top, so can she. jaja
Yazmin´s last essay ..The Vacation I Won’t Have For At Least A Year