Today’s lesson is all about pronunciation, and the topic is food. I arrive to 10 of my usual students, and another 10 drift in during the first 20 minutes of class. I say hi to Junia first, he’s always excited to show off his rapidly improving skills to the rest of the class. And he always has to add something a little extra than necessary. For instance, I pose the question “what do you eat for breakfast?” to the whole class.
“Junia, what do you like to have for breakfast?”
“Me?” He pretends like he didn’t realize he was next in line to answer.
“Yes Junia.”
“Oh.” Pause. “Ok. I am liking one thin slice of toast, eggs, and coffee.” He emphatically points one finger and raises his eyebrows, as if teaching me to count.
“Coffee with milk and sugar?”
“No, black.” Black is said carefully, with a slight rising inflection because I’ve only just five minutes ago introduced use of black to mean without milk (sans lait.)
“Great Junia, wow.” Some of the others glance at each other. I can tell they’ve been thrown by Junia’s use of thin, so I speak some bad French to clarify. “Mince, you know, comme ca,” indicating a skinny person with my hands. This gets us all up to speed except the two Somalians, Anab and Abdul. These two are often left to explain things to each other. They conference quickly and nod, they seem to understand thin. Somali sounds like breathing to me.
Guy is next in line to talk about breakfast. Guy is Tunisian, and very sociable and flamboyant. I would compare the way he greets me to the way a teacher greets the shyest girl on the first day of kindergarten. “Hello, how are you?” he’ll say from across the street, grinning, knees bent. When Guy said he was from DRC in class one day, I raised my eyebrows, knowing it wasn’t true. He gave me a look that said “we’ll talk about this later” so I didn’t press the issue. Turns out he now has to pretend he’s from DRC in order to get recognized as a refugee. Another student has to pretend his first name is his last name because the lazy bureaucrats at Home Affairs wrote it wrong on his forms.
“For breakfast I have eggs, bread, and milk.”
“Toast?” I point to the toaster I’ve drawn on the white board. “Or bread?”
“Bread, no toast.”
“Okay, bread not toast. Good job, Guy.”
Junia and Jacques snicker when I say “good job.” “Goohd johb, goohd johb” they shout to Guy, dissolving into laughter. This always happens when I say “good job.”
“And Jacques, what do you have for breakfast?”
“Black Label.”
“Black Label only? Hm, okay. How many?”
“Twelve.”
“Okay.” I keep playing along. “Expensive, eh? Trop cher?”
“Yes, expensive.” Jacques finally cracks a smile and the rest of the class chuckles a bit.
The next question is “what are you allergic too?” My mime of “allergic” involves exaggerated eating, itching, rubbing of eyes, clutching of throat. I do it twice because they don’t get it the first time.
Marie is allergic to aspirin. Anab is allergic to chicken, although I suspect she is merely expressing a strong dislike of chicken. I’ve been told that South African chicken is not very good. Earlier that day, two ladies in a class had gone into a long rant about the superiority of Congolese chicken. “This chicken, ca c’est - “ and they clapped their hands together forcefully, shaking their heads in disappointment. “Tough? Small?” But no, there was no adjective to match their feelings about this inferior poultry.
“ I am allergic to the women. And penicillin.” It’s Muhammed’s turn.
“To women? You are allergic to women?” Muhammed is grinning now, so I know it’s a joke. It must feel so good to be funny in a new language.
The next question is “what do you not eat?” Early answers include pork and alcohol (mainly from the Somalians), but Nzonzi sets the bar high with cat, and soon the room rings with laughter.
“Dog!”
“Butterfly!”
“Book!”
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