A little Spanglish humor for Navidad

On December 11, I graduated from language school!  (There I am with the Costa Rican flag.)  I am grateful for having had the chance to improve my Spanish before jumping into more hands-on training of ministry leaders.  I feel more confident...even though I'm even more aware of the mistakes I still make. :)  God did so much more in my life in the past 8 months than teach me Spanish.  Doesn't He always makes the journey more interesting than the destination?

Probably because of the "bad luck" of being classmates with the president of the student body, I was asked to give the student speech at graduation.  I won't print the whole thing here, but I ended with this poem (which I modified from the internet).  This sounds a bit like what's in my head these days--a big mess of Spanglish!


TWAS THE NIGHT BEFORE NAVIDAD

‘Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the casa
Not a creature was stirring. I wondered, “Que pasa?”
I was hanging the stockings with mucho cuidado
In hopes that old Santa would feel muy obligado
To bring all the children, both buenos y malos,
A nice batch of dulces and other regalos.
The children and I were asleep in our camas,
Some in long underwear, some in pijamas
When out in the yard, there arose such a grito
That I jumped to my feet like a frightened cabrito.
I ran to the window and looked out afuera,
And who in the world do you think that it era?
Saint Nick on a sleigh and a big red sombrero
Came dashing along, like a crazy bombero.
And pulling his sleigh, instead of venados,
Were eight little burros, approaching volados.
I watched as they came, and this quaint little hombre
Was shouting and whistling and calling by nombre:
"Ay, Pancho! Ay, Pepe! Ay, Cuca! Ay, Beto!
Ay, Chato! Ay, Chopo! Maruca y Nieto!"
Then, standing erect with his hand on his pecho,
He flew to the top of our very own techo.
With his round little belly like a bowl of jalea
He struggled to squeeze down our old chimenea.
Then, huffing and puffing, and a little cansado
He picked up a bag that looked so pesado.
He filled all the stockings with lovely regalos,
For none of the niños had been very malos.
Then chuckling along, seeming very contento,
He turned like a flash and was gone like the viento.
And I heard him exclaim -- and this is verdad --
"Merry Christmas to all! y Feliz Navidad!" 

Bad Habits (Spanglish 101, Class #1)

Learning to laugh at myself was a big part of my time in Peru...and it continues!  Language errors can be embarrassing, even harmful, but most of all they are forgivable, and often hysterical!  I thought I'd share a few of the funny ones here on my blog.

Last week in class, we learned how to describe when someone picks up a habit.  I had to come up with a sentence in Spanish and then translate it into English.  "Mi hermano le ha dado por fumar," was fine (and not actually true), but when I tried to translate it into English, I made everyone laugh.  Fumar is "smoking" in Spanish and my brain couldn't quite jump to English entirely.  So I somehow kept a half-Spanish accent on the last word and said, "My brother started 'fooming'."  If I had pronounced it "fyuming" I could have said, all in proper English, "My brother started fuming," but that would have meant something different entirely.

The verb "fumar" always makes me smile because of a story my friends tell about one of the former SIL Peru directors.  Police often stop foreigners in Peru and sometimes it's hard to get out of the situation without losing a little cash.  But in order for the transaction to occur, the foreigner has to at least speak a little Spanish.  My friend used that last bit to to his advantage when he was stopped by a cop (for doing nothing wrong).  When the cop asked him to roll down the window and started to question him, my friend (who is fluent in Spanish) looked up at him quizzically and said, "Uh...no...uh...no fumar español."  No, my friend didn't smoke Spanish. :)  The cop just waived him away.