of platinums and aminals!!

Sara and I have been reading Matilda by Roald Dahl for the past two weeks doing one to two pages nightly but last night we read four pages!!!

We're now at the part where Matilda punishes her father by replacing his hair tonic with her mother's platinum blonde hair dye. Sara can't get over how a little girl can do that to her father! She was kind of in shock as we read that chapter. She kept asking... Is Matilda a good girl or a naughty girl??! I felt bad... I have warped my child!!

And she had difficulty pronouncing platinum ... she kept saying plantimun!! but she has no problems pronouncing animal or anemone..

This morning, as we left for school and work, she declared that the plantimun chapter is the best one yet!! hahaha

confusing words for learners of the Malay language

Sara is still developing her Bahasa Melayu vocabulary... and this morning I let her read some of my Malay work. I asked her to translate a word and she gave the meaning of another but very similiar word. Made me realise how difficult language learning can be. I take BM so for granted, I forget she is still learning it.

This morning it was mengangguk. She thought it meant annoy.

The sentence was Fiza mengangguk. And Sara thought it meant Fiza annoys!

mengangguk - nod
mengganggu - annoy

I guess it's very easy to make that mistake. Another pair that gave Sara (and Noah! when he was expanding his vocab) some confusion is bulat and bulan!

bulat - round
bulan - moon

That reminds me... When Noah was seven, he came back from school with a question. He said, Mummy, What is sugar in Malay? I said, Gula. He pondered and asked, What is Heaven in Malay? I had to smile, because I knew he had Islamic Studies that day and they were probably talking about heaven and all. And his friends proably pronounced syurga (which is Heaven in Malay) with a silent 'r' as a lot of Malays do! Poor Noah!! He had quite a time learning the lingua franca!!

sugar - gula
heaven - syurga
candy - gula-gula

I'm learning French... so far so good... except for the pronunciations! A friend gave me this tip... he said dont say the last letter!! haha!! ok... yay!

Sara the Magazinator

Tuesday, Jul 23 2008, 7.23pm

She entered the car this evening announcing that she was one.

She defines a magazinator as a person who NEEDS (note the emphasis) and LOVES magazines.

Other words she coined to describe herself :

questionator - a person who keeps asking questions

.... hmm, I know there are more but at the moment can't remember any!!!!