Amantes de mis cuentos: Idiomas (Versión en inglés)

Foto: Ángeles Alonso

Languages

I´m going on a trip abroad. By plane. I´m climbing the plane stairs now, holding my father´s hand. It´s really warm here; but when I climb down the stairs, It´s cold and windy.

We´ve arrived in New York. English is spoken here. My mother speaks other languages. My father and I only speak Spanish.

We´ve been here for one month and we had been living at the house of some friends until my parents found jobs. At the moment, we are living in a small house in Brooklyn, which is also part of New York. My mother usually goes to her office very smartly dressed. My father works as a parking lot man. He always wears a blue uniform.

On the very first day I started attending lessons, the teacher made me sit down at a table with some other children. They were working on a puzzle, so I worked out mine very quickly and the teacher roughed my hair.

Vowels and numbers are written in English the same as in Spanish, but they are called differently. I tried to speak in English, but I couldn´t. So, I kept quiet the whole time there.

A boy pushed me down at breaktime. There I was open-legged but then, another boy came and beat him up in a stronger way. From his gestures, I could understand that he was telling my offender not to do it anymore. Then, my new friend helped me up; he smiled at me in a Spanish way and we waved good-bye to each other.

The next day, I looked for my new friend in the play ground. When we met, we smiled at each other, but both of us went about our own business. He went with his classmates and I sat down in a corner, waiting for my lessons to start.

After several weeks, the teacher seems to explain things in a clearer way. My mother told me then that it was me who was gradually understanding better what she was saying. I still keep silent in the lessons.

One Sunday, my father took me to a public park to play. My friend was there. I went up to him; as usual, we smiled at each other and later, when I was leaving him, he followed me. I started running and he did the same after me. We climbed up and down a slide after each other. We spent the whole morning playing. My father smiled seeing me so happy.

Yesterday, my tongue untied. The teacher and my schoolmates were astonished. I ran home shouting:

“Mum, Mum, I can speak English already. I´m the smartest one in my classroom ”.

My mother, as usual, quickly made me come down from those fancy clouds.

The fact is that she can speak French, German, English and Spanish.

Wow! I will never reach my mother´s level. Although, thinking twice, perhaps I may speak French and German and I just don´t realize it yet.

The End.

Traducción: Ramón L. Fernández y Suárez