Thursday, September 21, 2006

A truly rewarding experience

It’s a truly rewarding experience for me as a mother to hear my son repeating some words I say and to see him with all his might trying to communicate with me using the words he thinks represent his thoughts. My son is not even 2 years old yet and his vocabularies are increasing everyday.
Though some words are not correctly pronounced and it is very hard for me to understand what he is trying to say, I never feel tired and frustrated attending to him. I will try my best to guess and listen carefully to what he says. If I really can’t understand him and he gets frustrated (with me), he will just guide my hand (my finger) to point to the items. When I finally understand, he will look at my eyes and give me a big smile. Both of us will feel very very satisfied that we finally understand each other.
Since my husband, my maid, and I speak different mother tongues, this situation has make my son confused and he is learning to speak mixed languages. In 1 sentence he can use words from 2 languages at the same time. For example: when he says “duduk (= seat) big plane” and at the same time points at a picture of passenger seats inside an airplane. What he meant was “Those are the passenger seats inside the big airplane.”
Another example is when he sees a baby crying he will point at the baby and say “baby nangis (is crying) ya.” But my son can understand all the languages, such as when he counts up to 5, he can count using both English and Indonesian languages.
At the moment, he is only able to say a sentence consisting of 2-3 words only. If a sentence consists of more than 3 words, he will just mention the middle and the last word. For example: I want to eat apple and banana. My son will say “eat banana” and at the same time he will guide me to take (both) the apple and banana. Today finally he is able to add the word “apple” into his vocabulary data bank though he pronounces “apple” as “bobob”. At first I really didn’t get what he means every time he says “bobob”. But when I see him pointing (or showing me) the apple and saying “bobob” at the same time, then I understand him.
Some words that he can say them correctly are “big, plane, car, birthday cake, fish, goldfish, mommy, daddy, kongkong (grandpa), iyang (grandma - indonesian), kakung (grandpa – Indonesian), juice, bob (bob the builder children show), jojo (jojo circus children show), nangis (cry - indonesian), duduk (seat - indonesian), banana, dua (two - indonesian), bus, udah (finish - indonesian), abis (no more - indonesian), dude, kaikai (take a walk – Chinese dialect), spoon, and, clock, bobok (sleep – Indonesian), baby, book, boy, daddy’s car, minyak (oil – Indonesian), eek (pass bowel motion – Javanese Indonesian), bau (smelly – Indonesian), buang (throw away – Indonesian).”
Other words that are difficult to pronounce (according to him) will have new pronunciation which are close enough or sometimes too far they become completely new words invented by him… J When he says these words, I really can’t hide my big laugh (but I have to hide my big laugh though so that he doesn’t feel insulted).
For example: tempeh (Indonesian fermented soya bean cake) will become pepeh. Tempeh is his favorite food, by the way.
Other examples: jambu (water apple – Indonesian) will become babu. Balloon will become berun. Porcupine fish will become badabada fish. Circle will become kiko. Crayon will become keyan. Milk becomes miec. Drink milk becomes nenen. Eat becomes mamam, water becomes onyo onyo (this one he has invented it since he was 8 months old). Everytime he says onyo-onyo, I always correct it but he prefers to stick with his own invention… J There are more words but I just can’t remember them.
Wow, it seems only yesterday I gave birth to him and got frustrated when I couldn’t understand the meaning of his crying. Now suddenly I have a partner to communicate and an entertainer that will follow me every where I go. Isn’t it wonderful?
It really does a rewarding experience for me to be able to see him growing up and pick up new skills everyday right in front of my eyes. I love you my son. I truly do.

Monday, September 11, 2006

The rabbit story

One day Betsy the rabbit sat down under the moonlight, trying to recall the last conversation she had with her best friend, Binny.

Binny: “Betsy, I am tired of being a rabbit. I really want to be a lion.”

Betsy: “Why do you want to be a lion, Binny?”

Binny: “Because the lion is the king of the jungle. The Lion rules the jungle and all animals are afraid of a lion. By being a lion, I can be more powerful and no other animals dare to touch me or even to eat me.”

Betsy: “Why do you want to be more powerful, Binny?”

Binny: “Because at the moment, being a rabbit, I feel so insecure. If there are other animals bigger and stronger than me want to disturb me, they can just chase me, pull my long ears, and make fun of me. They even can just eat me because I do not have enough courage and speed to hop away from them.
I want to be bad and powerful so that those who want to eat me or make fun of me will think twice if they want to do that to me. They will just choose to avoid me and leave me alone. That’s what I want. I am tired of being attacked by other big and scary animals. I feel so powerless. I want to scream to them so that they leave me alone but they can’t even hear my voice and they shut me up all the time. They don’t even give me a chance to speak what I want. They don’t care about me. They think I am just a worthless bunny rabbit.”

Betsy: “But it doesn’t mean that once you are a lion, you will be bad, scary and powerful when deep down in your heart, you know you can not be bad and scare other animals. You are not a lion. You are destined to be a rabbit and a rabbit by nature is not an aggressive animal that will attack and scare other animals. A rabbit is a very peaceful animal."

Binny: “But I don’t want to be attacked all the time without even given a chance to fight back.”

Betsy: “Go ahead then! Try to attack some other animals! See if you can do it. I know you very well just like I know myself. You won’t be able to ‘wear’ the lion skin. It won’t fit you. You won’t be able to pretend that you are bad and scary because you are not. We are the same bunny rabbit. We are not scary. We are lovable and like to live in peace. We eat vegetables, not meat. I think that is why we are not scary. Just accept it, Binny. I am sure God has a very good plan for us, the rabbit. He won’t let us be eaten or attacked by the lions for example.”

Binny: “Oh, Betsy. I just wish that these lions would just leave me alone and stop attacking me.”

Betsy: “That’s easy, Binny. Just hop away as fast as you can and never turn back.”

Binny: “It’s not that easy for me to just hop away from my predators when they have gotten my long ears.”

Betsy gives a big sigh and shed her tears. She remembers clearly seeing her best friend, Binny, was trying her might to hop away from two big scary hands which grabbed her long ears, pulled Binny away from her, killed her and made her into a delicacy dish, barbecue rabbit. She had no power to help her best friend.
She knows her turn will come soon and suddenly she wish that she were a lion. Now she understands why Binny wanted to be a lion.

Tuesday, September 05, 2006

Start your day with a laughter

I love reading a newspaper. Every morning while having my breakfast, I normally browse through all the pages and read the big title news.If there is an interesting news, I will remember the page and will return to it after I finish browsing all the pages.

One of the pages I always love to read first is the comics page. Garfield comic will be my first choice, then the rest of the comics, and I finish it with the horoscope section.

Friday, 1st September 2006 newspaper is quite special because when I read the comics section, Hagar the horrible comic (by Chris Browne) caught my attention first, instead of my beloved Garfield. After I read the Hagar story, I just couldn't stop laughing for the whole day.Even when I slept at night, I still remember that funny Hagar and started to laugh quitely.

Hagar was talking to his son, Hamlet.

Hagar: "Hamlet, when you marry and have your own home, you must always be on guard againts the hidden enemy! They will invade your home, eating and drinking and helping themselves to your money and your possesions unless you're very careful!"

Hamlet: "Who will these people be, daddy?"

Hagar: "They're called in-laws."


Whua..ha..ha..Even while typing this I still can't stop laughing. If you don't know what's so funny about it, get married and soon you'll be ROTFLYAO (Rolling On The Floor Laughing Your A** Off) just like me. Whua..ha..ha..It's so good to start the day with a laughter.