Through the Lingual Looking Glass

Just when I thought I wouldn't have inspiration for a blog this week, I stopped by the produce shop on my way home today (ahem, my produce shop, as you will recall from last week's Produce Wars.)

Mama Produce greeted me enthusiastically, asking how I was doing while bounding around the counter to help me. The last time I had been in her shop, it was Thanksgiving morning and I was trying to buy enough potatoes for the mashed potato-philes who would be eating at my house. Perhaps I had been moved by the holiday spirit, but I veered from my usual routine of smiling brightly, nodding, and simply rattling off my produce list, and I had announced (what I hoped translated to..) that the day was an American holiday and that I would be cooking for nine people. Mama Produce was ecstatic for me, and after filling my order, piled into my bags handfuls of oranges and pears, "offro" ("my treat").

Today, nearly two weeks later, Mama Produce followed her profuse and cheerful greeting by asking me how my holiday dinner had gone. I was moved by her attentiveness and mentally reaffirmed to myself that I would faithfully patronize this shop until the day we move away.

Mama Produce was filling my first order, "tre pepperoni rossi" ("three red bell peppers"), when her adolescent son stepped up beside me and asked in an accented child's voice, "What_is_your_name?" He seemed delighted at my mixed expression of being both caught off guard and pleasantly surprised. First, I exclaimed, "Bene!" ("Good!") then told him my name. Mama Produce explained that he studies English at school. What followed was a delightful interaction that taught me more about how I must sound to an Italian than I could ever hope for.

After the boy's initial brave inquiry of my name, I asked in slow, deliberate English, "What is your name?" He cocked his head to the side, so I asked the question in Italian. To this, he answered quickly, with a look that said "ah, I know that one!" Next, he nervously tapped his fingers on his chin while gazing at the ceiling, and I could practically hear the gears in his brain turning. I know precisely what he was thinking too: "Oh no, I got stupid and brave and tried to talk to this person in their language, but I said what I had to say and now I can't think of how to say anything else relevant - think!!" I turned toward the register to give him a moment to think, but before Mama Produce could tell me my total, he was at my side again:

"Do_you_like...chicken??"

Immense restraint was involved in reining in my delight. I managed to shift my focus from tickled humor to asking him the same question in Italian, "Si. E tu, tu piaci pollo?" He giggled and nodded, thought for a moment while I sifted through Euro coins, then produced another zinger: "Do_you_like...chips?" I laughed and nodded, realizing that I'd need to contribute to this exchange or the peppering of "Do you like (anything he knows in English)?" could go on for awhile.

In deliberate English again, I asked, "How old are you?" I was treated in response to a terrified expression that I recognized only because I myself have flashed it to countless Italian folks, one that unmistakably said, "Aaa! I don't know! I should know, but I don't! I should've kept my mouth closed from the beginning; I'll never be able to do this!" I wanted so badly to give the boy a huge hug and sooth the fear away assuring him, "It's ok, really! I do the same thing. Languages are hard!" I repeated the question of age in Italian, and some brightness returned to his eyes when he answered in English, "Ten."

I had paid for my produce at this point, and Mama Produce was walking my bags around the counter. The boy, with confidence regained, bounded around the store, pointing to produce and exclaiming, "Green! Red! Yellow!" Again, I struggled to resist running to him and dancing around the shop hand in hand. I've done the same thing! When I put my ego out on the table and attempt to talk to someone in Italian, and if I feel like I've made a bit of a fool of myself, I've been known to blurt out anything I know in Italian - a last-ditch effort to say, "I'm not completely ignorant of your language!"

Mama Produce was stuffing six "offro" mandarine oranges in my bags as we stood near the door and the boy took one last stab:

"Do_you_like...Italy??"

At this, I smiled warmly. "Yes," I said, "Yes, I love Italy."



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