Saturday, January 3, 2009

It's a FREAKING good life!

Last year Aria was a teaching assistant in several high schools in Cagliari, the capitol city of Sardinia. Besides assisting the teachers she was able to work with the students directly giving them the opportunity to converse with a native English speaking person. She also developed written and oral exercises and games for the students to practice the language and to learn about American culture and history. During the time I was visiting her she shared with me some of her students work. There was one particular assignment: to write about your favorite English word, which resulted in some poignant results. I will share two of my favorites.

Dolores wrote: "My favorite english word is "wake-up" because the sound of this word is more beautiful than "svegliati."* If my mother speaks English, she could wake all my awakenings happy only with two words "wake-up". When I heard this word I think about a sunny beautiful day. Nothing can be wrong."
*svegliati (wake-up)

Gianluca wrote: " My favorite english word is an American one, it comes from the American slang language and it could mean a few things. The word is "Freak". The English dictionary says about it that in italian it means "capriccio", but this is not the way I use it. I like to say Freak a lot because it reminds me the first time I said something in English, in fact this is the first word I've learnt in that language. It was matched with another funny word that combined sounded so crazy like the meaning of it, it was "freakin' nuts", that mean "so crazy." In fact, Freak, means as I said before lots of things like, crazy, damn, ouch, lot of and so on....I love the sound of it I've always used to subsitute it instead of some bad words...it sounds like something stronger, something you must to say! When you want to say something very, very, very far away. Instead of saying three times very, you just say...its freaking, far away and it sounds good! There's something special between me and that word, it's weird to say I know, but it reminds me about a good friend, the one who taught me this freaking word. I think I'll it in my dirty English vocabulary for the rest of my life."

This is something I'd tell Gianluca if he were with me today. "Gianluca, guess what? Tomorrow is my Happy Freaking Birthday and I hope its the start of a freaking good year!

7 comments:

Holly said...

my favorite english word? not really sure - but one of them is definitely 'friend'. happy birthday dear friend...and here's to you and a freaking good year!!

Anonymous said...

Hi Barb, I wanted to pop by and wish you a Happy Birthday! I hope your year is filled with much health and happiness.

Anonymous said...

Happy Freakin' Birthday, Barb! And it IS going to be a good year.

This is a fun post, it's always interesting to see what your favourite words will turn out to be in a new language.

I work on my French a lot and one of my favourite words is "vacances." I love it, partly because I love vacations, but I love the natural way it seems to roll off my tongue. Even speaking in English, I want to use it: I'm going en vacances!

barb cabot said...

Thanks Holly, Kim and Sandra for all your good wishes. It's going to be a good one, health and happiness wise for all. That's going to be what I wish for tomorrow when I blow out my candles (am thinking I better bake my own cake tonight!)

Sandra love your "vacances" word. I was going to blog about my favorite italian word but I'll tell you right now. It's "Francobolli". For some reason ever since I first heard that word it cracks me up. It just sounds so frivolous to my ears. I can barely get the word out when I go to the tabaccheria without laughing. It sounds too jolly to mean STAMPS.

Anonymous said...

What a freaking great post - I love it!

My new favourite word is abound (as in "abound in hope" from the passage Romans 15:13) Everyone at this time of year seems to abound in hope, joy, peace, friendship, love...yay New Year's!

I love the way you write - just added your blog to my list of favourites!

barb cabot said...

Your blog has been added to my faves too! Thanks again for the Romans 15:13. I'm going to talk about that one of these days soon. See ya!

Anonymous said...

This is a wonderful entry. Still can't figure out how to add a comment properly, so I have to be Anonymous. It's me--Karen M.! I agree about "francobolli." Happy Birthday to a very dear friend who has a freakin' great blog.

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