Picture of the Day

I Only Speak Mandarin

My daughter has been taking Mandarin Chinese lessons since she was three. Now she's six, and is really starting to like the idea of she and I having our own "secret language." She also likes to learn silly things and then say them to me to get a reaction. The other day, she learned the word for monkey. It is 猴子, or hou zi. We're sitting in a restaurant and she points to me and says, "Mama, hou zi!" (As in, "Mom, you are a monkey.") So I lean in and say to her in English, "Blythe, that is not very nice. I am not a monkey." She looked at me, smiled and in her best Valley Girl voice said, "Um, yeah...I'm not very good at speaking English, so you're going to have to tell me that in Chinese."