Learning the Language

One of the first things Abraham said clearly to us was "yes." He said it with a kind of hissing extension of the "s." He almost always said it while his attention was drawn elsewhere so that it wasn't so much an expression to agree as it was simply to respond. It seemed to be his version of the ubiquitous response from kids: "uh huh" which means "I hear you, but I have no idea what you're talking about."

For the first few days, it was his only response. This meant he'd take any kind of food we offered, wear whatever clothes and be amenable to almost any kind of activity. It was much easier to gauge a response based on his facial expression combined with some pointing.

For the kids, it didn't matter. Talking was optional. With kids, it's the universal rhythm of play that perpetuates the day and postpones any other physical needs. I think this is why it became so easy for Abraham to fit right in. With Owen, he had a companion. With Olivia (she's our middle one and is four), he had an alternative to Owen. With Evangeline (the youngest at 2), he had someone to look out for and someone who knew as little English as he did.

In the first week, he'd tried popcorn and taught us that it's called "fahn deh shah" in Amharic (his native language). That was as much of his language as we'd retain. He taught us a few other simple words as well but I couldn't repeat any of them. I tried Googling Amharic which yielded a few simple phrases and taught us to count but didn't seem to help us communicate any better.

Then one day he sang a song that was to the tune of "Mary had a little Lamb." After he learned more English, he explained the word we assumed was for lamb in the song was actually the word for bread. I haven't gotten a translator to negotiate here, but it almost sounded as though someone had picked up the old nursery rhyme and interpreted "had" as "eaten" rather than "owned." I'm pretty sure that bread wouldn't "follow her to school one day."

Over the next couple of months, Abraham rapidly picked up English words and before long was conversing quite a bit. We began to learn more about him. He has an older brother who apparently sleeps a lot. He has two older sisters. His dad is an electrician. He has a television at home and knows about Coca Cola. Beyond that, we began to hear stories about his life in Ethiopia, similarities and differences from life in the US.

A few of my favorite things that he left us with:

1. He called Evangeline's pacifier a "pasta fire."
   
2. We call Olivia Liv for short. When Abraham said it, it always sounded like "Lovey." It's my new pet name for her.
3. We introduced ourselves to him as "Kevin" and "Kim," thinking that would be easier for him than calling us "mister" and "misses." However, he quickly adopted the kids names for us, "mama" and "papa."
   
4. Once, when he lagged behind on a field trip, Kimberly said "hurry up, Abraham, you need to catch up." "Ketchup, mama?" he asked, perplexed. Hot dogs and hamburgers were more common to him at that point than phrases of urgency.
5. "Me go, too?" The car never left the driveway without Abraham running out to find out where one of us was headed.
   
6. A barrage of questions pursued any activity. Abraham always had to know why things were done a certain way or why we were going somewhere or what something was or who was on the phone. He was more inquisitive than all three of our kids together. He got a lot of answers too.
7. The laughter. Abraham found so many things amusing. He wasn't bashful about adding peals of laughter over almost anything. My favorite moment was when he described how I snore at night, making a snorting sound and laughing hysterically.

The most touching part of our time with him was when he desperately attempted to explain something to us. Using the few words he knew, he would put a sentence together, pause, squint, searching for the right word, make gestures and tighten his lips as though trying hard to push a word through that might be somewhere in his head. It made me wish I knew more Amharic. It just reminds me that he met us where we were and learned our ways rather than us learning his. It's an amazing human ability, especially for a six year old.