Pinot, Bretzels, and Cathedrals

There is one thing for certain that many South African’s living near Perth, Sydney, Melbourne, Auckland, London, Edinburgh and Dublin cannot do easily:  have a private, loud conversation in Afrikaans without running the risk that some stranger will chip in with their 10c opinion.

I am much more fortunate here in Strasbourg.  I think the grand total of us are less than 10, and I would not count Stefan as a risk, as he’s from Durban, en hy praat nie die Taal nie.  I do run the risk of having Belgians and Flemish eyeing me out, so I do not do this as a habit.

My bigger concern is having my Alex interpret my Afrikaans conversations out loud, as happened yesterday.

My friend Mme H, who hails from Pretoria if you remember, looks after 2 little girls on Wednesday-mini-weekends (to help out professional academics, and extra income).  Her own son is in Alex’s class, and the 2 little girls are about the same age. They speak French, English, and the older girl also speaks Dutch and German.  Last week H suggested that we visit a local museum in the afternoon, so that the girls could meet each other.  As I am anxious that Alex develops friendships with girls whose home language is not English, I am very happy that these 5 small children get together for an hour or 2.

After we raced through the museum under the beady eye of many an assistant (Beth is just a little bit too young for museums), we had 2 hours to spare before H had to drop the girls at their home.  As we have a little more space than H, I suggested they all come back to our home for juice and cappuccino’s.

One of the little girls is a little bit of an ‘airy-fairy’, and her eyes opened wide when she saw Alex’s jewellery box.  (It is packed with all sorts of cheap plastic junk, which ends up in every nook and cranny, and is often found blocking up my vacuum cleaner).  This little girl put the cheap and nasty Little Mermaid clip on earrings onto her ears, and that’s the last time I saw them.

After they left, I dumped my girls in their bath, and started packing away toys.  (Oh, what my life has come to.)  I had a second look around for the little earrings, knowing Alex would ask for them, and they were nowhere to be found.  I quickly messaged H, to ask her to check if the girls had the earrings, and the reply was that they had been put back in the jewellery box.

I took her word for it, and put it to the back of my mind.

The next morning during my run back from school, H phoned.  She was phoning to apologise that the little girl had indeed pocketed the earrings the day before, and her mother had found them in her jacket pocket.  H had been instructed that the girl would have to apologise, and the earrings would be replaced.

Moving on a week, yesterday-Wednesday- we all met up again at a different museum.  As we were removing jackets into lockers, H stopped, and said to the little girl: “R, do you have something you need to say to Alex?”

Very sheepishly, little R softly said: “I’m sorry.” 

I told her not to worry, and that all was forgiven, and left it at that.

Hayley then turned back to Alex and me, and said, in Afrikaans; “Sy wil nie sê hoekom sy is jammer.  Sy is skaam”

Cue my little Afrikaans girl: “She doesn’t want to say why she is sorry. She is –” at which point I had to cut her off, mostly because I was laughing so much, and also because the look of amusement on H’s face.

My first thought on this topic, is that I am so chuffed with Alex.  We don’t speak Afrikaans here at home, and although every week when we Skype Oumie en Oupie, who speak to her in Afrikaans, Alex often gets tongue tied, and her words mixed up when she replies in Afrikaans.  However, her understanding is still very accurate, and we must make more of an effort to speak Afrikaans to her.  Perhaps I should insist that if she gets together with Hayley’s’ girls again, they must only speak French and Dutch.

My second thought on the topic of languages, is to marvel at the many nationalities and languages found in this city.  I suspect there is no other French place like it.  Their school (The Vauban campus) takes in French children who speak English, children who are English, German, and many other extraordinary nationals- Icelandic, Ghanaian, Polish, Dutch, and Slavic.  It is amazing that my girls will grow up in this environment, and although I don’t think they will ever learn a Slavic language, I love the fact that they will rub shoulders with these other little personalities.