scolding in any language

Hey Everybody! Mimi's back! Take it away, Mimi!


Yuki has now been going to her Japanese preschool/daycare for more than two years. And while it took her a while to talk, she is now a confirmed bilingual person. Her language skills are equal in both and she never mixes up the two. I am bilingual but I became so in my teen age years, thus I put each language into my brain one at a time. It has been interesting to watch how a child can take in two languages at once.

Obi to the eye!

According to some nerdy linguistic books that I only skimmed through, the best way to make bilingualism happen is to have the parents speak their native tongue to the child. So if both parents are from another country, they should speak their native tongue at home. If each parent speaks a different language, they should stick to their own. Apparently, sometimes immigrating parents make efforts to speak to their kids in English to try to help, and the kids end up picking up bad grammar and parents' accents (I've seen it happen first-hand). So obeying this philosophy, I speak to her in Japanese, and Philip speaks in English. She gets 100% Japanese at school and English everywhere else. As a result, she has learned who speaks what and can use the corresponding language. According to her teachers, this is pretty much how it goes with bilingual kids. Amazing.

But here is the side effect: because the conversations between Philip and I are in English, and I obviously use both languages between Yuki and the rest of my world, I often have to switch my brain rapidly. I have done numerous amount of translating for Philip and other friends when they have come to Japan so I've had practice, but it hurts my brain because Japanese syntax is the opposite of English and the sounds your mouth has to make are totally different. Yuki now gets mad if I speak to her in English (which, I think is good), so in mid sentence to Philip, I have to switch to Japanese to talk to her. Sometimes I start off in English and realize it's the wrong one for Yuki and switch. But other times, we are both speaking in English and we switch half way together. I am the only person Yuki uses both languages with, so I guess there is that. Brain. Hurting.

Get this woman some ice. For her brain.

Also, I had to learn how to scold in Japanese. I have been an educator and a nanny in this country so I have all the discipline language and phrases in English down. BUT I haven't had that opportunity in Japan because I left when I was 15, so I actually have to stop and think of how talk in that way. In addition, there are obviously different discipline methods between the two cultures that play into the language so I have to translate on the fly while I'm using American methods in Japanese language. For example, using "time out" is very American (and British judging from Super Nanny — not that I watch it), but it's totally effective so I use it but since Philip and I both use the method, I have to use the English term "time out" for her to understand it every time. And so on. I still stumble sometimes in making my point and think, "that didn't come out smoothly".

Koi Nobori. Or as Dadoo calls it, "Fish hat."

But what this has done is also dust off and polish my Japanese. I use it every day now between Yuki and talking to her teachers, I also read and write more because of that, which is way better than me trying to keep the language up by myself.

The other night, I was gone to rehearsal so Philip, as he often does, was putting Yuki to bed. She requested that he reads this Japanese book so he just started making up the story to go with the pictures. She quickly stopped him and told him to read it so he did, but it takes him a while to sound out the letters. After about two pages, Yuki snatched the book and said, "Let me see that." Philip texted me saying, "I totally failed her." Poor guy.

They'll work it out.

I kind of can't wait until she figures out that not everyone speaks Japanese here and for us to have secret conversations.