Integration, disappointment

[elfs]

This weekend, while Omaha and I were at the grocery store, I passed by three women who clearly represented three generations of the same family. The eldest and the middle were chattering back and forth in one of those bouncy south-Asian accents such as Vietnamese or Cambodian. The conversation got heated, and the eldest walked off in a huff.

Then the youngest, an ordinary-looking teenager, turned and said, "Mom, what were you and Grandma talking about?"

This reminded me of Nick Gillespie's appearance on O'Reilly, where he pointed out that by the third generation almost no immigrant children speak the language of their grandparents' home country, and their attachment to it, whatever it may be, is given distance by that lack of common language.

On the other hand, I was also with the kids at a playground the other day, andit was time to head home. We were going over to a friend's house to have dinner, and they had fresh strawberries. "Come on, kids. It's time to go get strawberries."

This little boy, maybe five, was standing next to Yamaraashi-chan as I said it, and he said, "What are strawberries?"

Oy.

Comments

[dossy.livejournal.com]

re: the strawberries -- Oh, the paralysis of fear.

My wife won't let our kids (6 and 3 years old) have chewing gum because she's afraid it'll get stuck in their hair.

Sigh.

[memegarden.livejournal.com]

I'd rather have a kid who didn't know what chewing gum was than one who didn't know what strawberries were.

I'm sometimes startled by things D. hasn't heard of, and then realize she doesn't watch television, and it makes me smile.

[marketeer]

I have a friend who works in a grocery store. In order to work as cashiers, potential employees have to pass a test which involves being able to visually identify produce items in order to be able to them up. They routinely get applicants who can't identify common fruits and vegetables, like apples and carrots. It's sad.

[pixel39.livejournal.com]

My aunt speaks some German, because my grandparents spoke it at home while she was small. My mother did not, and my uncle does not, because they were born six and seven years later and by then WWII was over and it was generally considered A Very Bad Idea to be speaking German. I think Mom's generation is the 2nd.

[hastings1066.livejournal.com]

re strawberries: One possibility is that one of the parents is allergic. That said, my daughter knew most fruits and vegetables by 5 due to all her flip books and our shopping trips.

Five isn't so bad not to know what a strawberry is

[dakiwiboid.livejournal.com]

Here's a really sad tale. I was present when a man of nearly 50 ate fresh cherries for the first time.