the things we say

I believe that the greatest gift I can give to my son  is my time. I love to spend time with him, just chatting about our day or reading together, or talking about something new that he's curious about, or laying on the cushions watching a movie or cartoons, or taking a walk to the shops or to the library. Because he was born in Korea, he's had a lot of catching up to do. Things that we take for granted are still a great source of curiosity for him. So I treasure the time that we have together, not only because the time we spend together is priceless, but also because of the absolute gems that come out of his mouth!
For instance, the other day my husband was giving Molly, our dog, a bath, and he sent NJ to get a rag from the bathroom. I laughed when I heard NJ say, "what's a rag?" He's only been speaking English full time since we came back home last year. For the first six years of his life he was speaking Korean most of the time. There are lots of things that he can't identify in English. The good thing is that he's at an age where he's quite comfortable asking "what's this?/what's that?". The questions are constant and seemingly never-ending.  There are times when I find myself having to explain, what is to me, the most mundane or inane things. I've had to explain the difference between an SA/kombi-taxi and the sedan-type taxi that we would take in Korea. I've also had a difficult time explaining why he can't just go up to any "black" person he sees and say "Sawubona"!
On the lighter side there are some awesome language trip-ups that he's had, like one day when I served him cole-slaw, and he asked his dad why he wasn't having any. His dad answered that he doesn't like cole-slaw, so my son called  me and suggested that I give dad some hot-slaw instead!! I was practically rolling on the laugh after that.
Another day, when I was getting ready to do some washing, he calmly asked me if I would come and play with him after I'd finished "downloading" the washing in the machine!! That one was a testament to his exposure to technology all his young life!
There have been countless other similar occassions and I'll be recording more as I remember them or as they happen.