Comments on: Con Gusto

By: M. Avila

M. Avila — Thu, 18 Aug 2011 19:20:40 +0000

Thank you for your honesty and courage in this article. I feel the same and agree with you.

By: Beebs

Beebs — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 15:32:52 +0000

I wish my mother had take the measures you are taking to be conscious of instilling your culture onto your daughter. My mother’s tongue was Italian and she was so afraid of being an immigrant that she chose to omit this part of herself to us. I think it’s made huge gaps in both my sister’s and my understanding of our ethnicity because it’s not just that we don’t really speak Italian but that our mother completely became American- she thinks. dreams and loves in English. Sure she made us food, and has an accent and speaks lovingly of la dolce vita- but to her its part of her past not our history. It’s like a dream she and my father share that merely paved the road to us but is not our journey to go on. Today there are whole parts of my family with whom I can not speak to- and the onus is on me I suppose to learn the language and seize my heritage for myself but how much more enriched might my life have been and how much better might my English have been had I been raised bilingual? In short- you are giving Mari all of yourself as opposed to half. Good job! PS- I absolutely adore getting to know all these parts of you I never knew through your writing- thanks for sharing. PPS my mom is a huge fan too.

By: Susan

Susan — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 10:50:39 +0000

What a beautiful post! I find I do the same thing. You are not alone. But I love your viewpoint on how your daughter sees it, so I will try to be brave and do my best too!

Susan

By: soultravelers3

soultravelers3 — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 09:09:28 +0000

Great post! We’re monolinguals raising a very fluent trilingual, so really understand this. It actually gets harder the older they get, I think.

My husband’s parents are truly bilingual because they only spoke Spanish until they went to school ( & then continued Spanish only at home with parents who never learned English despite living in the US). Nobody in his family considers him a Spanish speaker, although he picked up a tiny bit from his Grandmother.

It was really hard for him to only talk to her in Spanish and as she became more & more verbal, it was very limiting on their relationship, so he eventually switched back to English.

Wintering in Spain for the last 4 years, helped all of our Spanish immensely.

Our daughter is now 9 and the most fluent Spanish speaker in our family, so it was all worth it, although we continue working on it daily. Hang in there, it is worth the effort!

By: Susan

Susan — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 08:24:11 +0000

Beautiful post! I loved reading it and learned a lot.

By: Ana Lilian

Ana Lilian — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 00:05:08 +0000

Bravo! Beautifully written and expressed. You being so open your fears and doubts is even a bigger lesson for your daughter to admire. She will one day know what an effort it was to give her the gift of the language she will associate only with pure AMOR.

By: Beth Butler

Beth Butler — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 19:29:05 +0000

Gracias/Thank you Elsie for sharing such a personal and emotionally-connecting account of where you stand with your languages, your cultures and the struggles between the fine lines of both.

Let me say that I totally admire your candor and willingness to share with others who undoubtedly are struggling with similar challenges. How blessed is your daughter to have a mom so very aware of the need to embrace both the English and the Spanish languages, and how full her life will be that you keep her connected with various cultures.

Do you hear the applause Elsie?!?!? I know there a hundreds and hundreds of women applauding you as I write so celebrate your victories and focus less on your shortcomings. With determination like yours, you will succeed!!!

By: Yazmin

Yazmin — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 12:21:52 +0000

It’s funny… I find myself feeling the same way about my language skills. I have less than a month before we start our 1 parent / 1 language routine here at the house, but I worry that I won’t be up to the challenge – that I’ll fail miserably since I have my own reservations and hang ups when it comes to speaking Spanish. It’s somewhat comforting to know I’m not alone in my daily battle to force myself to speak Spanish and better what I know.