Monkey Maxims #4

From first words from the mouths of babes to the fantastical stories woven by toddlers and preschoolers, experiencing your child's attempts at language is an eternal spring of amusement.  I would say this is even doubly so for parents of bilingual children, because two languages = twice the fun.  One thing I did not expect with J was the fact that he would have a foreign accent in English, even though he is learning it from native (or pretty much native) speakers.  I suppose Czech can be considered his "first" language, because it is what we speak at home and it's what he hears a majority of the time, so it is no surprise he is far more fluent in Czech than in English.  But let me tell you that there is nothing cuter than hearing a three-year-old speak English with a Czech accent.  I'm assuming that since I don't have an accent in English, nor do any of my other friends or relatives who learned English at a young age, his will eventually disappear, but for now we can rejoice in the mirth this causes.

Perhaps the following examples cannot be attributed to J's accent in English, perhaps they are just one of those mispronunciations that can be attributed to learning a language in general, but they're pretty darn funny any way you see it (or at least I think so):

About a year ago, J built a masterwork of Lego Duplo, and was scooting it across the table saying "My fireshit!  My fireshit!"  After asking him to repeat what he was saying and numerous more attempts at edification, he insisted that "My fireshit!" was the correct  pronunciation.  When someone becomes a mom, they also inherit an uncanny ability to be able to decipher what to others may sound like complete babble, but I had to admit defeat in this case.  It wasn't until later when I was relaying the story to P that he enlightened me.  Apparently, "Fireshit" is the correct pronunciation for "Pirate Ship" in J-language.

These mispronunciations are becoming more rare as J gets older (fear not, there are many more oppotunities for language mayhem on the preschooler front!), but just a few days ago, I witnessed J running through the house saying "Let's get a tumor."  I was unable to get clarification on this one, so I'm offering a prize to the first person to decipher this code.  And by "prize," I mean that you'll feel really cool if you figure it out.