Wednesday, April 13, 2011

'Sup Nana? (Nanaphone Footage)

In my eagerness to share of our new-found communication with those gone before, I completely forgot that Geoff had captured some footage of another 'phone call' with Nana like those that I described in The Nanaphone post. Before you eagerly dive in to enjoy it, let me explain a bit about this chunk of the conversation.

Kaya had picked up the handset that was sitting on the phone on the shelf and started talking 'to Nana'. We couldn't figure out what the heck what she was talking about and were wracking our brains in an attempt to do so. Was it English? Was it German?! Jibberish? And then it hit us like a Mack: she was clearly asking Nana, "what's up," but a helluva lot less formally.

We were both shocked, not only because it sounded cute and funny as hell, but also because we honestly couldn't imagine Geoff's parents teaching her ebonics! Nor anyone else in her life (yeah, we just outed ourselves as white-foke who hang with white-foke)!

So, you'll come into the video where we are thrilled with our discovery and are asking her, like all proud parents do, to repeat it like a parrot and perform for the camera: say it again, say it again, say it again, Polly! She's lovin' it, eatin' it up, probably confused as hell as to why we're so overjoyed, but clearly un-phased by her confusion in her eagerness to make us laugh!

And then, the real truth comes out, raining on our Polly-parade a bit: once I ask her (in German, of course!) to share with Nana what she'd done today, it hit me: she's not asking Nana "w'ssup", but telling her, instead, that she'd gone to "sahp", a.k.a Swap(nPlay), our community space for playing and trading...

Ah well. It's a worth a few laughs and a good story nonetheless...!
Enjoy.

p.s: lustig = funny (Kaya calls the telephone lustig after I respond in German to her English comment)...

1 comment:

  1. What is it that I come across all these awesome blogs nowadays ;)...
    I am a German native speaker living in Germany currently on vacation in the Seattle area and I am raising my son in German/ English. So just like you just the other way around! Can't wait to read more about your adventures. I have a German blog that you can follow if you want.

    http://zweisprachig.blog.de

    Keep it up! I am super excited to find someone teaching their kids German!

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