Category: language bites
-
The magic of being bilingual.
On the way to gan this morning, Koala spotted a firetruck on the road. Obviously, this made his morning, and for the rest of the way cried out in excitement, “Fire truck! Fire truck woke up! Fire truck is here!” He was still talking about it as we walked up to the gan door, so…
-
Moving to Israel? Make sure you Stick Around.
To ulpan or not to ulpan? It’s up to you, but it doesn’t have to end when you leave the musty, dingy premises of the classroom… Take ulpan home with you with Stick Around. The story behind Stick Around goes something like this: “Aaaahhh!!!” my wife yelled, and even though it’s not a word, I could…
-
There’s a sabra living in my house.
First of all, today, for the first time, my kid בא נראה’d me. Secondly, OMG *this* just happened. The scene: Bebe is finished with her cottage cheese and I offer Koala the rest. Me: want to finish Bebe’s cheese? Koala: yes, I want this. <takes a bite> Koala: cottage! Me: yep, it’s Bebe’s cheese. Koala:…
-
Letting go.
Into my seventh year of aliyah – living in Israel – I finally, finally, finally have been able to start what every oleh needs to do the second they get here. I’ve started letting go. Letting go of my pride. Letting go of my mistakes. Letting go of my fear. Maybe it’s my bilingual kid.…
-
The snail and the sleepyhead.
The latest word I have learned from my son: חילזון. Snail. In their ‘autumn curriculum’ they’ve been teaching about the usual Israeli fall topics: rain… clouds… raindrops… leaves… rain… and snails (?!). I don’t think I’ve ever seen a snail here in Israel. Anyway, the teachers have been getting a kick out of my son…
-
Teaching your elders.
As the world turns… When I was growing up, the thing was this: my parents’ generation decided to send their kids to Jewish day schools, to give them an education they never had as children of immigrants who wanted to forget being Jewish. So we went to school, came home, taught our parents kiddush on…
-
Learn Hebrew online for free, visit your Israeli grandchildren.
If Learn to read in Hebrew for free wasn’t enough for you, here’s something better… Struggling to learn even minimal Hebrew to get by on a visit to Israel? Or even just to get past security at the airport? Saw this posted on Facebook, had to share: Learn Hebrew phrases with Audio It’s a free website…
-
That was fast.
I thought it would be a couple more years before this happened, but here we are at a month shy of two: Koala came home from gan today calling me אמא (Ima). He’s been calling me Mama this whole time, and maybe I prompted this myself; last night out of the blue I asked him,…
-
Fadichot leaking all over the place.
Every other week or so when I pick up Koala from his gan, his ganenet passes me the pants I dressed him in that day and I look down and see him wearing the poofy red replacement pants we keep there. Always with the same explanation: “He leaked again so we changed him…” I guess…
-
Immigrant parenting fail.
Ok, maybe I don’t exactly fail yet. But I’m headed in that direction. I attended an event tonight for the ‘gan mothers’ for which I had to push myself to go, and, not surprisingly, a room full of women + socializing + not knowing anyone + doing it in Hebrew is a mess of a…
-
Bo, mama.
I may correct your Hebrew now, but sometime in the future – possibly the near future – you will be correcting mine.
-
Today’s moment of Zen.
I said to Koala: “Are you a קוף?” And he looked at me and… coughed.