Monday, June 23, 2008

Uh-oh, this way

One of the two little girls I taught to say 'uh-oh' and 'this way'.
Back at the farmhouse, I grew impatient waiting for the tractor to take its maiden voyage down the path to the farmhouse. The sun was beating down, and the sky was perfect for pictures in the rice fields. I finally decided to just wander off down the trail. Ponheary said it was only about 1 km down the road. I hadn’t gotten very far when two little girls--two and three years old--ran after me. At first, I thought I was crazy to be walking along with two hyper little girls that could not understand a word I said. It turned out to be a blast—and I learned how much communicating a person can do without talking.

The cutest thing was seeing them like curious kittens, stopping to look at bugs, zigzagging across the path and chasing butterflies. I pointed at one and said “butterfly” and they repeated it a couple of times but it was too difficult a word for their mouths.

After not too long, we came across a huge puddle. “Uh-oh,” I said, to be followed only moments later with a chorus from the girls signing “uh-oh, uh-oh, uh-oh.” Shortly thereafter, we came across the mother of all puddles. To my surprise, they both said “uh-oh!” It was cute, but there was no way of easily getting over this one. So, we backtracked until we met up with the tractor, and hitched a ride on it.

I also taught them to say “This way,” and I would often change directions and say, “this way.” I made a game of it, and before you knew it, the two of them were calling to each other (and me) “This way.”

2 comments:

Joyful Pilgrim said...

Awww.... keep the children stories and pics coming - I love them!

Tom said...

The family I am staying with basically lives in a guesthouse, and rents the other rooms. It is so awesome, and they have some really cuts kids who all speak English (or are learning to). It is a lot of fun, and, yes, the stories and pix will keep coming. Tomorrow, I travel to a rural school to help teach and hopefully will snap some pix of me and my classmates.