May 23, 2008

A proud TOEFL* moment in our family

Yesterday afternoon I popped a downloaded version of "Juno" in the dvd player and settled myself for an afternoon of finally finding out what all the Oscar fuss was about. Movies from the Internet usually are without subtitles, the user has to find and add them, but I figured since I was about to watch it by myself no one would mind.

Daughter#2 -a great film buff, despite her young age- heard the call of the fox searchlight opening theme in her room and came dashing to the living room. I warned her that there were no subtitles and she might have a hard time discerning the dialogue, but she just waved me off to shut up because the movie was starting.

I was iffy as to whether my kid was getting all of the movie's conversations. And then she surprised the linguistic heck out of me when she laughed aloud at the following line.

Juno's father on being told by Juno that she is pregnant closes the scene with "Yeah, but if I see that Bleeker kid (aka father of baby) I'm gonna punch him the wiener".


I looked suspiciously at Daughter#2 and wondered how in the world she knew what a wiener was... I mean I never remember EVER using that word and I wondered if her frontistirio (English language center) had ever focused on slang words used to replace the word "penis".

I asked if she reeeeeally understood what the father had just said. And she replied affirmatively with an eye roll, still giggling and blushing.

Quite impressed of how far advanced my kid's English was, I paused the film and filled in some linguistic gaps informing her that wiener is also known as hotdog and frankfurter. She kept giggling.


--------------------------------------
*TOEFL = Test of English as a Foreign Language