2016 brought us down South, Alabama! At the end of the summer we moved to a little town south of Montgomery, Alabama. We found a beautiful old house in the Historic District of Prattville. I had so many reservations and fears about moving down here, the weather during the summer, the schools' ratings, the lack of a Dual Language Program, among other things.
Six months later, I have no desire to move back up North. However, I have experienced very many interesting things here due to my accent.
My first experience happened at my younger daughter's school when I was there as a sub. A second grade classroom, 17 kids, all Caucasian, (According to http://prattville.areaconnect.com/statistics.htm 98% of the population here is white) so, not very much diversity in the school.
so, I come in, say good morning, and the first thing I hear back from a little boy is: "Why are you speaking Spanish?, we don't know Spanish here!" Kudos to him for recognizing my accent, right?!
I smiled and continue with my sub routine. He continued with his remarks throughout the morning, I graciously ignored him, especially because it wasn't hurtful, it was more like, why do you speak like that? Can you speak English now, until after lunch, when I asked him to start working on his paper instead of goofing around and he said: "what did you say, I don't understand you, I don't speak Spanish." My Hispanic blood boiled (a little) and I said: (with my best Hispanic accent) "I know what you mean, I can't hardly understand what you are saying with your thick Southern Accent!" And I walked away. The other kids laugh and told him to shush for the rest of the day!
I subbed at the school almost everyday of the school year. I learned to love those little first and second graders with southern accent! And they learned to love my Hispanic accent as well, I manage to include some Spanish teaching at the end of each day and by the end of the year I had a lot of kiddos asking me to say something in Spanish again! I think they were thirsty for diversity. My daughter was also bombarded with questions about the Spanish language, even my oldest daughter, who was in a different school, was able to show her skills speaking Spanish sometimes. She felt so proud of it and her eyes beamed when she told me her experiences.
I think my biggest problem has been understanding others when they speak, specially if they speak too fast and have a very marked southern accent. I had to go back to my strategy of nodding and smiling. 😉 It has been an adventure for sure!
