Boggled

It poured down rain all day yesterday in Paris (and is still pouring down rain today). We had to leave the library by a different door due to the flooding outside of the usual exit. Did this keep library patrons away? Of course not! I felt like those poor cafeteria monitors in elementary school when "recess" was held indoors because of the rain. I had a bunch of kids. For a long time. But they were great fun.

These two brothers were with me for hours. The older one read the entire Disney version of Alladin to his brother, in English. With a speech impediment and a French accent. The younger one sat quietly staring off into space for at least 45 minutes while his brother read. I'm not sure he understood a word. I pulled out boggle for the boys to play next. Pretty soon I heard, "In English this time," (the older brother had perhaps lived in the US when he was younger as his English was quite a lot better than the younger.)
"No, French," (said in English.)
"It's better in English."
"I don't care, I'm doing French.
"Okay, you do French and I'll do English," (well, if you know the game boggle, this just won't work for the scoring system.)
Their American mother came in later and they decided to play together in English several times and then in French once for the younger one. The mother sounded great to me in French, but she had to ask how to spell things and some of the meanings. I've always thought how fantastic it would be if I have kids one day for them to be fluent in another language (if only their arguments would be about weather to play boggle in French or English!) but it was the first time I recognized that, like this mother, I would never be as full a part of their world in that language as I would be in English. As Nels would say, "Hmm. That's sad."

I'm off to Madrid this morning. No new entries until next week.