November 16, 2012
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Happy Diwali...
Yesterday we celebrated Diwali in the kitchen sink. I dug out mostly used golden tea light candles and she found a small copper bell from India on a shelf where it'd been long forgotten. We pushed a chair up to the kitchen sink, dropped in blue bath tablets, and floated the lit candles in the Ganges River. I hesitated about lighting them (and the whole playing with fire thing but I was right next to her and she knew we were doing something special and unique). She rang the bell and shouted "Happy Diwali" before blowing them out and repeating the experience two more times. We talked about how Diwali was a Hindu holiday and how it came from India (which she knows about from her globe and her parents love of Indian food). It is the beginning of our exploring festivals of light this season, but I am hoping it is more than floating candles in a kitchen sink.
I am hoping it is the beginning of a love of all kinds of culture and experiences; a place where she can find more in common with people who are "different" from her and can give her a foundation for understanding that people are respected for what they believe and think even if it's different from what you believe and think.
We have been playing with culture since she was a baby. She can count to five in Chinese, Spanish, English, and Japanese. We are working on learning French and I'm searching for a bit of Russian to teach her. Maps and globes are a critical part of her life already thanks to her Mom's love of them.
She loves language and word play but Chinese is still her first love. It helps that we have adult friends who speak Chinese and make an effort to read Chinese books to her when they visit and play with her. When she heard a friend's Taiwanese parents were coming in December, she asked, "Does Angela's mommy speak Taiwanese? No," she self-corrected. "Chinese. Does Angela's mommy and daddy speak Chinese?" I was impressed because this summer she didn't know about adding -ese to the end of a language's name and wasn't sure how to say she could count in Japanese so to be able to guess that people from Taiwan would speak Taiwanese is a nice jump.
"They speak both even though Angela doesn't speak much Taiwanese." She nodded seriously and then asked for her Chinese DVD (as if to brush up!).
At some point, we'll meet YeYe for lunch with his coworkers from around the world so that she has faces to go with her languages. Knowing real people who speak the language makes it worth the effort. She learned to count in Japanese this summer while visiting with a Japanese friend and his wife.
Her knowledge is incomplete- she doesn't know the stories behind Diwali, or that there are many ways to count objects in Japanese, or that Chinese has many dialects to learn, or... the list of things she doesn't know is endless, but she won't be three until Sunday. She's allowed to have a child's understanding of complex things. She's learning faster than we can teach her and she is beginning to apply one set of knowledge to a new setting (so there will be a ton of things she gets wrong in the near future!). Yet, I think she knows the important things- saying sorry when you hurt someone, sitting and thinking when you make a mistake on purpose so that you won't do that again (she puts herself in time out and can tell you what she's thinking about), loving people for who they are, and letting people know that you are here and have an opinion.
I wasn't going to write about the girl today, but the things I'm learning from my time with her are things I don't want to forget... so they are here! Sorry! And Happy Diwali to my friends who celebrate... and to those who don't... Happy Day to you... may you find joy and excitement in the simple things of life- a sink full of water, a few candles, and an old bell.
Comments (8)
Happy Diwali to you! C's introspection and ability to narrate it is pretty amazing. I think I did that when I was a little older than she is and then I stopped for some reason. Being able to communicate such things and bounce ideas off of people you trust without thinking about it is amazing. Great job!
Lovely to read!
@BoureeMusique - I think we encourage children to quit doing that. We want them to sit quiet and not embarrass us while C will embarrass you in a heart beat since she's so out there! But I like that about her. I like that she'll tell the yard man he's hurting her ears and insisting he stop and that if you skip her in storytime that she'll remind you instead sitting quietly with her feelings hurt like another little girl this week. I like that she'll ask a complete stranger if they like elements or can count in Chinese. If we show any kind of dislike about an activity, she will quit it instantly so I try to tread very softly around her and express few negatives. I've learned a lot about how to be with her from her parents and we've encouraged her to use her "words" from the time she was tiny and only had a few. We also used sign language with her but she reserves that for people who speak sign language so you'll rarely see her use it. The interesting question is why you stopped... hmmmm.....
@tracy - thanks!
As they say in Chinese, Tai hao le!
Happy Diwali to you too!
Yes Taiwanese is a language that the natives of Taiwan speak. Other Chinese from the mainland speak Mandarin and my folks from near Canton speak Cantonese.
Instead of Ni hao ma? we say Neh ho ma? but at least the number three, san is similar for Mandarin, Japanese and Cantonese.
Indian New year is earlier than Chinese New year. A Indian lady wanted me to help her clean and unfortunately I couldn't make it.
@PPhilip - my friend Angela is from Taiwan, but she's not learned much Taiwanese at all. I would love to be fluent in it, but it's much easier to learn a language as a baby than to try as an adult. Plus, my mandarin is horrible... tones are a mess!
@Bodhiseeker3 - thanks! and to you too!