Sunday, April 26, 2009

Le chien est dans le four

You know you like a blog when you buy the book version. Which I did for Christmas - Pat received a copy of 'Stuff White People Like'. Which I bought because I think the blog is amusing, despite not knowing whether Pat also thought it so. Bad girlfriend.

Anyways, it's kind of embarrassing...actually, very embarrassing...when it comes to completing the checklist at the end. Vegetarian? Tick. Lover of vintage clothing? Tick. Brings along own string bags when grocery shopping? Tick. Moleskine notebooks? Yes. Tick. The latest on my long list of 'whiteness' is bilingualism (see #78). Where will it end?

So yes, I'm attempting to bring up a little bilingual. I like to think that, having graduated in Modern Languages and Linguistics, I am exempt from the White Person connotations in my quest. (Exempt? SWPL is messing with my mind.) French was my major and it's what I speak best (everything else is pretty woeful), so French is what Babushka gets.

I've been speaking French as much as possible, describing everything from the neighbour's cat to how I brush my teeth, and learning children's songs to sing to her. This site has some of my favourites - I put them on while I'm in the shower, they keep playing in a loop so there's no chance of them not becoming firmly lodged in my memory.

But, major or not, I have a feeling that I'm probably doing more damage than good. The poor girl will be getting every article wrong (in a language where vagina is a masculine noun and the slang for penis is feminine, well, it gets confusing), have only a very tentative grasp of the subjunctive, and she'll probably end up swearing like a tiny French pirate.

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