Put the Gujarati away!

We leave for Gujarat, India in 3 weeks and 5 days. For the past month or so we've been attempting to cram as much of the Gujarati language into our craniums as possible, hoping that we might comport ourselves with honor while we are there. A-chan is raring to get on the plane and go, but has different feelings about us speaking a language that she can't understand.

She's been with us at every language lesson, a huge slice of cake in front of her and a bottle of applejuice to help keep her happy and occupied while we try to learn. Whenever we practice she is there listening to us. Some of it has seeped in and she can say certain things like 'Tame kem cho?' (How are you?), 'Hu majama chhu.' (I am fine.), and can count from one to ten in Gujarati. But whenever she gets frustrated with it she will tell us to "Put the Gujarati away now."

Lately as our date of departure is getting closer she has actually asked us to speak Gujarati with her a few times. As we watched a Gujarati movie last night (kind of a test to see if we could understand any of it) I wondered if she was getting any of it. The songs seemed to fascinate her but the rest was pretty much ignored. We managed to understand a few words here and there, and we were surprised by how much we enjoyed watching it!

I'm looking forward to getting to Ahmedabad and seeing how much Ketu and I have learned (or failed to learn as the case may be) and to see if A-chan absorbed more than she's letting on. I am hoping that as soon as she realizes that if she learned to speak a little Gujarati she could potentially speak to other little girls during our trip then she would pick up more words instead of being frustrated.