Snippets

Here are some collected moments that don´t warrant a blogpost themselves, but together, give you an idea of how some of my daily interactions play out.

Ennui: Milexi is seven-years-old. She´s my neighbor, and one of my biggest fans and most frequent visitors. She´s kid-sized of course, with the missing front teeth so common among second-graders everywhere, but sometimes I forget she´s so young. She respects the boundaries I set better than anyone, and sometimes responds to my comments with the knowingness and maturity of someone a lot older than seven. We recently had this exchange:

C: How do you feel about missing so much class because of the strike?
M: Good. I´m done with school.
C: What do you mean? You don´t want to go anymore?
She sighs.
M: Look. I went to pre-K. I went to kindergarten. After that, I went to first grade. What grade am I in now? Second! It´s enough, I´m tired, OK?

The Photo Album Experience: Sharing pictures of my family and friends from home is one of my favorite things to do with visitors. The people here in QP are endlessly curious about my family (bordering on obsessive when it comes to my mom) and life in general in the U.S. I have a nice assembly of photos of everyone and-- even better--some of snow and ice. The word incredulous is best defined by a Ngobe trying to understand snow. I will walk you through some of the snapshots that get the most comments.

Picture 1: Me, Dad, Millie, and James cutting a birthday cake. Millie is centered in the middle with her arms around James and Dad, rendering them invisible. The conversation is this:

Ngobe: Your grandmother doesn´t have arms.
Cati: Yes, she does.
Ngobe: Where are they then? I don´t see them.

Picture 2: The Charles River in the fall. Dozens of geese at the river´s edge.
Ngobe: WHAT ARE THOSE?! DUCKS?
Cati: They are called geese.
Ngobe: You must bring some to me. I want to raise those.

Picture 3: Any picture with snow or ice in it.
Response: What is that? How do you grow things? Is there finca? How do dogs/people/trees survive? Why would people live there anyway? Cati, I don´t think their meant to. Hey, can you suck on the ice?

Picture 4: Me, at some point in college, looking noticeably more gordita.
My neighbor Rosita points to the photo, and says, ¨Ok, now here in this picture, Cati, you look healthy. You were in good shape! Now? Now... you need to eat more bananas.¨

That night she sent me a soup full of more yucca than I could possibly eat. Her intentions are obvious.

Picture 5: A Habitat for Humanity trip in college. We are on the beach, and one girl is wearing a t-shirt and bathing suit bottoms.

Ngobe: Why is she in panties?!?! She´s not embarassed? Did you bathe in that ocean?

How to Name Your Baby:

Everyone has a real name, a Christian name, if you will. It´s the Spanish name by which they´re registered (if they´re registered), and is what they will use in school, and for all professional and official purposes thereafter.

But you´ll almost never hear their parents call kids by their real names; there are at least two other names to choose from. One is the name they use in the house, and the other is a second nickname, often in Ngobere.

The household names suffer from a devastating lack of creativity. There are about 5-10 that make up 90 percent of nicknames. They are: Niño/a, Bonito/a, Mami, Papi, Bebé, Chino/a, and Chuey (for light-skinned kids. Chuey means gringo/foreigner in Ngobere). The youngest kid is always called Chi or Chi-Chi.

Are you confused? Let me offer some examples. My host-brother´s name is Kaicer, but his immediate family calls him Bebé, and other close family and friends call him Lalo. Rosibel is my four-year-old best bud, but she is most often called Obaldina or, by close family, Amoi. Her brother, Abdiel, the oldest, is also called Bebé and Pachikon. Milexi, the middle of the three, is called Niña and Mamita. I still laugh when I see her siblings yell for her. Mamita!

You can imagine how things get confusing. The upside is that you can call any kid niño, niña, or chi, and they will respond right away.




Milexi/Mamita/Niña and her sister, Rosibel/Obaldina/Amoi