Linguistically Challenged
Now I know at least one person with a linguistics degree reads this regularly (perhaps two), but hopefully everyone else will enjoy it too.

I am struggling with the local language. To be expected, but my strugle is not that I don't understand it (although I don't understand it well, I can get along). My strugle is that when I speak it, every foreign language I have ever tried to learn seriously comes out (Japanese doesn't count, I only dabbled).

So for one, I go to the toy store last night to purchase the requisite bribe for Isaac, who from all reports has earned it quite nicely. I get back into the car, and manage to communicate to the driver that now I didn't need to go to the hotel, I had enough cash, could we just go straight to the art gallery.

1. I realized later that the words I used (No quiero hotel, solamente galleria) translated roughly to: "No need Hotel. Only Gallery.
But it got the point across. Eric (who speaks fluent spanish and english, and was on the phone when I got back into the car) was quite impressed.
2. The major flaw, was that "La Galleria" is the name of a major shopping mall. And when we came hurtling off the roundabout, in much the same way the Galileo probe got a little gravity boost from Jupiter, I saw the looming great mall, and realized my mistake. Imagine my horror when Don Roger turns into the parking lot, and I had to try and explain "No no no. The Art Gallery."
3. At said art gallery, I committed major "dumb american" faux pas number 312. While she was ringing up my purchases (ok, adding them up on a calculator), I was glancing at a very left wing looking newspaper, and trying to understand it. She offered it to me, saying it was free, and I declined, trying to say "No Entiendo" which means "I don't understand", but instead falling back on "No Comprende", which I beleive means "I don't comprehend", or more succinctly "I'm kind of dumb."
So anyway, after she wraps up Noelle's gift (I pray to GOD she likes this one, cause the last one was a total bomb), I find myself looking down at the newspaper. I look up at her and say "Mucho Gracias" (thank you very much), and she replies with something I don't recognize.
So I, in my somewhat stunted state, reply "No Gracias" to what I think is another offer of the newspaper, "No comprende."
She says it again, and I reply "No, no gracias."
Then she looks at me with a somewhat quizical expression and says "You're welcome." in English. She had been saying "De Nada" which means "you're welcome" and I had been basically replying with "No, No Newspaper, Damnit. I'm too dumb!"

Needless to say Eric who had let me down quite badly as a translator at this point, proceeded to laugh his ass off all the way to dinner.
4. Today, I caught myself speaking a language that can only be described as "Melange" (french for "mix").
The sentance was roughly "Combo numero Quatro, por favour, avec Coca Light."

So...let's examine that phrase by phrase.
"Combo numero quatro" = Combo number four (in Spanish)
"...avec..." = with (in French)
"Coca Light" = Coke light (Spanish/English).

So linguistically, I'm speaking the equivalent of Minestrone soup.

It wasn't as bad as the other day when I said
"Es ist muy bueno."
"Es ist..." It is ( German)
"...muy bueno" very good (Spanish).

So the word Hodge Podge keeps springing to mind, and frankly it is only a testament to the incredibly forgiving and "Relejado" (laid back) attitude of all the Nica's I've met that I have received anything other than giggles, and confused stares.

The lady in the art gallery notwithstanding.

It's time for some more...
Random Thoughts from Nicaragua
Yes, you guessed it, I'm back in Managua, doing some training for four new reps who have been hired to replace the reps who have left, and that has left me with some random thoughts.
1. I have failed as an Allen. Those of you who have a) known the whole Allen family, or b) been part of said family, will know that photography is very important to this particular clan.

I, on the other hand, forgot to bring even a disposable camera down here, much less our relatively nice digital one...and the worst part is that I'm not all that bothered by it...which makes me a traitor to the clan...or something.

2. Nicaragua, can be quite a cool place, once you get outside of Managua, which I did today. I went to a town called Masaya, to the big market there, and saw the countryside. It was cool (ok, it was about 27, or about 9,006 with the Humidex, but that's cool for here) and misty, and beautiful. We zoomed along the highway and saw volcanoes, and plantations, and little villages, oh, and lots of people hanging quite precariously off the back of Pick Up Trucks, but as they say, when in Rome...

3. Nicaragua, I beleive I have mentioned before, is a nation of poets and writers. I didn't really realize that, but there in the middle of Masaya, basically the Nicaraguan equivalent of a touristy knick knack market, was a booth of books. And not trashy used paperbacks, no, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and Isabelle Allende, and the previously mentioned Ernesto Cardenal. I asked if they had any Cardenal translated in English, and he shook his head sadly no.
Then I asked if he had any Ruben Dario (the latino equivalent of Shakespeare), and I believe I caught most of the reply, which was "He is our national poet, we simply would not translate him out of Spanish."
So I left it at that. So while I would like to read some Dario, I think I'm going to have to look for translations in a nice quiet university bookstore...in Canada.

4. The food here, continues to be amazing. We went to the aptly named "Rosti Pollo" today (means, literally, "Roast Chicken"), and had amazing food. I have also discovered something important about the Diet Pepsi here. If you drink it straight from the can, it's awful - it has almost a Vanilla aftertaste, which is fine for some, but not for us addicts. You wouldn't see a pusher on the corner of Parliament and Gerrard pushing Hazelnut dusted Crank, or Swiss Chcolate Almond Smackaccinos, so don't mess with my Diet Pepsi. The discovery, though, is that if you put it over ice, it tastes like normal Diet Pepsi I'm used to.
Frankly, I'm at a loss to explain, and I figured it out quite by accident, and have been testing the theory ever since, with consistent results. Very odd.

5. Don Roger, the driver I mentioned at length before, has gotten in touch with his Inner MIG pilot (he used to fly MIG fighter jets for the Bulgarian Air Force (Ok, the Soviet Air Force in Bulgaria)). He now drives like he's flying a MIG. I made the horrific error of sitting in the front seat today. I think I aged three years. You know when someone's going way too fast for the comfort level of all inside the vehicle, when the truck goes to lane change, and everyone inside simultaneously shoulder checks...except the driver.

I'm sitting in the back from now on, preferably surrounded by pillows. I have to hand it to him though, he knows his vehicle like the back of his hand...exactly what it's capable of in all weather situations, and even though it's doing my heart a bit of damage, I know I'm safe. Hell, he may not be young enough to pilot a fighter jet anymore, but he's still got what it takes to do 80km/hr on a quiet side street filled with random suicidal j-walkers, and not have so much as a near miss.

6. More on Masaya. In the market today, I was fully prepared for the onslaught of pushy, aggressive market vendors...frankly what I've grown used to in markets in various neighborhoods in Toronto, where restaurant owners will see you looking at the menu, and come out side and stop just short of bodily dragging you in and duct taping you to a chair (i.e. Skylark in the Gerrard St Indian Bazaar in Toronto comes to mind), so when I got to Masaya, I expected the worst.

Well, I was shocked, to put it mildly. I went into a booth, and the very nice lady started talking to me about what she had to offer. I looked around, smiled and said "Gracias", and she said, and I quote, "Mucho Gracias."

That was it. No last minute offers, no price drops, no nothing. She smiled and followed me back to the entrance. I was stunned.

I have had Panhandlers in Montreal who were 100 times more aggressive than that.

I must be a fluke, I thought, but it was like they were telemarketing in a "no rebuttal" state (some states in the US have a 'no rebuttal' law, meaning that if a residential telemarketer calls you, once they have finished their pitch, if you say "I'm not interested", they are prohibited by law from saying "yeah, but..."). They'd make their best pitch, and when it didn't work, that was it...shake hands, walk away, no hard feelings.

I think, however, that it says something deeper about Nica culture. They are to a person the most incredibly polite people I have met. And I'm not just talking about people in the service business, I'm talking about colleagues at the call centre, I"m talking about students I trained...get this: After every class, last time, all the guys in the class would line up to shake my hand before they left, look very seriously into my eyes, and thank me for a good day. It was kind of wierd at first, but then I grew to really appreciate how much they appreciated me. By the end of the week it was a big old mutual admiration society...I expect more of the same this week.
I think the whole concept of being pushy 'hawkers' is just not on the radar. Now, I'm sure in the famous Mercado Oriental things would be a bit different, but I don't know if they would ever be as bad as some of the market and street vendors I have seen in parts of Toronto.

So I officially like it here. And although I can take or leave the city of Managua, I think the people of Nicaragua have wormed their way into my heart in a way I didn't quite expect.

Oh, and I bought Isaac a Xylophone. How cool is that?

Happy Anarchy Day!
So for those of you in the know, today is Isaac's third birthday. We of course celebrated it yesterday, when Teresa was here from Vancouver, and in general weekends are better for this sort of thing.

So we start with the obligatory stack of loot from here and far, and relive our old guilt and excess of consumption we experienced last year. It's too much stuff, he doesn't need all that, we're spoiling him, I wouldn't dare tell my class in Managua on Monday what we got him, etc.

Quite an odd position for parents, I suspect. Most of the parents I know feel guilty that they can't get their kids enough for birthdays, etc. I think Noelle hit the crux of the problem when she realized that most of what we bought for him was under $20. In fact onle a few items were that much, the rest under $5 or $10. So when you spend a few bucks at that point, it piles up pretty quick.

So enough of our guilt, how did Isaac react.

Well, I should mention that Noelle went to considerable effort to create a Thomas the Tank Engine cake. She baked a square cake, cut it out according to the template I drew (really, my only contribution) and then iced it according to a DVD cover we had.

It was nothing short of spectacular (pictures will be up in a couple days).

So Isaac comes down the stairs and says, and I quote, "Wow...look at all the presents for me...and a Thomas cake...that's amazing!"

It was very cute.

So once he got into the swing of things, all he cared about was ripping off paper. I think he actually enjoys ripping off the paper more than he enjoys playing with the gifts. In fact, I think for Christmas, I may just rewrap all of his toys and let him re-open them all. (Talk about Scrooge!)

He also really enjoyed the monster hunting kit, the magnifying glass, butterfly net, and walkie talkies. They were a hit.

But some of the biggest hits were the giant dump truck (thanks Donna), the dragon costume (thanks Danielle), the ambulance (thanks Mom), and the five piece drum kit (thanks for nothing, Jonathan!). It's going to be a very interesting, not to mention noisy, of couple of days.

Keep your eyes peeled for photos. I will post more later.

Wee-oh Wee-oh Wee-oh
So today marked the beginning of fire safety week in Hamilton, and they kicked off the week with free tours of any fire station in the city. What could be better?

With that in mind, Isaac and I head downtown to Station #1, to see the sights. Well, it turns out that Station 1 is not in the most residential part of town. In fact, it's in a fairly dodgy part of downtown that happens to be a block from both my and Noelle's office. So in short, we had the place to ourselves, and the undivided attention of about 4 firefighters.

Isaac was greeted at the entrance by the VERY enthusiastic Fireman Jay, who proceeded to lift him up into the drivers seat of a ladder truck, show him some of the cool ladders. Show him a hose and a nozzle, and how it worked, and crack wise about how little work the Chief and the Safety officer really did (see how white their helmets are?) the whole time.

He was spectacular, and when I asked his somewhat dumbstruck colleagues, they replied that Jay had two small boys of his own, and he really enjoyed this kind of thing.

Then Jay ran upstairs and slid down the pole while Isaac was waiting, and then took us on a tour of the little one room Firefighter museum there. It was very cool.

Then an ambulance showed up, and Isaac got to help it back into the station (complete with Jay's prompting of the hand signals). Then they gave him a little red Fire Captain's plastic hat, and we got set to go.

And of course at that point Isaac starts charming the socks off the blonde EMT, so she agrees to show us the Ambulance. He gets to see the computer, turn the lights on, and climb in the back, where she promptly hooks an ECG up to him, and does a little printout of his heartrate. It was amazing.

Then a call came in over the radio, and she had to hustle us out of there, and we got to watch while she and her partner took off, with their sirens blaring.

As if that wasn't cool enough, as we were about to go (thinking it couldn't get any better), they then dispatched a Pumper truck to the same accident, and we got to watch that one take off.

With appropriate good byes and thank yous to Jay, we set off for the car. The whole time as we are walking along, Isaac is pretending to talk into an Emergency radio, and making Wee-oh Wee-oh Wee-oh noises (siren noises) the whole way down the street. He is clearly pumped.

Halfway there, I realize that police are redirecting traffic down a side street, and that the accident our new friends have been called to is about another block away. So we go to take a look, and while we are standing there and gawking, one of the firefighters waves and says "Hi Isaac!" Isaac is of course thrilled.

Then we went for slurpees, and then to the park at the bayfront and played on the old tugboat they've pulled up on land and turned into a playground.

All in all, it was a wonderful day.

Special thanks to all the crew at Hamilton's Fire Station #1! You guys rock!

Facial Expressions
So I don't know what you know about kids with Down Syndrome, but in my (albeit limited) experience, I have always thought that a variety of facial expressions was not their strong suit.

This does not seem to be an issue for Sam.

I mentioned the other day about the look he gives you if you're eating something, and he's not. Well I stumbled across another one.

Today, Noelle popped out for a haircut, and I was left with Isaac napping, and Sam to feed lunch to. Of course, when it comes to baby food, I'm at a bit of a loss, and for just such occaisions, we have gone to the extraordinary length (for Noelle, anyway) of buying premade baby food.
This time, it was a half eaten jar of Pink Beans, Chicken and Rice puree.

Now I know enough by now that I need to thicken it with a little rice pablum, for him to enjoy it, but I vaguely recalled him not enjoying it that much last time. This time, though, after the 1st spoonfull, he looked up at me with an expression that clearly said:
"Dad, what the hell was that?"

I have never seen disappointment and displeasure so clearly displayed on a baby's face.

Then his expression turned to general sadness, and his right eyebrow lifted (yes, only the right one), and he looked up, and ... well, I gave him another spoonfull. And after a while it was ok. But for the first few mouthfulls, it was clear he was not impressed.

So that's Sam's facial expressions.

He's also back to shouting, and now has added growling like a Tyrannosaurus. Which is cool too.

Isaac is now asking why about absolutely everything, even if he knows the answer. Like I step out of the shower and he asks,
"Why are you drying off?"

The worst part is the he clearly knows the answer, he just wants you to say it. In fact, he really just wants you to do his bidding.

The other day, I was going a little nuts, and I said, "Isaac, can you please stop asking why for two minutes?"
"Why should I stop asking why?"
So it's pointless to even argue.

So more about Isaac being really complicated. Sam, is in fact, incredibly complicated. We went to the Dr. the other day, and he said that he was concerned about some of Sam's gross motor skills being a little behind (he is 7 months, and show no interest in sitting up).
Noelle replied that "He's actually doing well for a kid with DS." To which the Dr responded, "I'm not comparing him to kids with DS, I'm comparing him to kids without."

Which of course poses a problem. We decided a long time ago that we didn't want to define him by his disability. He is not Down Syndrome, it's just something he's got to deal with. Kind of like my Tourette's, or Noelle's totaly inability to be on time for anything (only more severe than that, I guess). At the same time, however, we want to keep expectations of him reasonable.

So the balancing act continues of a) not defining him by his limitations, and b) keeping our expectations reasonable, and such that he can acheive them.

I think we for the most part err of the part of a), but we do have b) moments. The other day at the Dr. was one of those.

So at this point, we are looking into gross motor development exercises, and some things we can do to keep him developping normally...or at least as normally as he is able to do.

Life is never dull in the Allen household.

Avril Lavigne
So the other night at dinner, Isaac does what I call "dropping a bomb."

No, it's not what you're thinking, although he does that occasionally at dinner too.

What I'm talking about is little sayings or expressions he comes up with out of the blue. Clearly they have been spinning around in his mind for a few minutes (or maybe even hours or days), and then they kind of pop out.

So at dinner, he looks up and says "I'm very complicated."

What can you do but laugh?

It was, however, a startling level of self awareness for someone who turns 3 years old in 2 weeks.

So I figure if he already understands fundamental truths about himself at 3, he's probably going to be well into Anthony Robbins, or Trascendental Meditation, or Eastern Mysticism by the time he hits Kindergarten.

In other words, if anybody is planning to send him clothes any time soon, maybe you'll consider a nice set of saffron coloured robes.

The worst part will be him trying to psychoanalyze the other school kids in JK.

No, the worst part will be him trying psychoanalyze us.

No. The absolute worst part will be him telling the Elementary School Prinicipal that he/she suffers from a 'rigid authoritarian complex arising from unresolved parent/child hostility and lingering unadressed self-esteem issues.'

Because you know it's going to happen.

The Red Pager
Years ago, at Beaches Presbyterian Church in Toronto, one of the gentlemen (and the title truly applies) I sang with in the choir was a man named Michael. He had been trained in the British Church Choir tradition, and was one of the finest musicians I have ever sung with, but he had a very interesting day job.

He was the head chemist, for one of the nuclear (or as W. would say, Nucular) power plants in Southern Ontario.

Once he came to church not only with his usual cell phone (which was attached to his hip), but a bright red pager.

"New Pager?" I asked. "That's pretty flashy."
"No," he replied. "It's my turn this weekend."

It turns out, that several of the managers had to take turns carrying this pager, which only beeped when there was a ... shall we say... incident?

"So when it goes off, that's bad?" I asked innocently.
"My goodness. Yes."

On Tuesday of this week, I'm pretty sure Michael's pager went off. But they finally traced the source of the full blown multireactor nuclear meltdown to a quiet urban street in Hamilton, where there is normally no nuclear activity at all.

Yes, Isaac has entered "the terrible threes" In fact, everyone I know with kids old enough says that the 'twos' are actually quite pleasant. It's the threes that get really interesting.

Well, Isaac turns three in ... dear God, is it really?...under two weeks, and he has gotten a little jump start on the whole "asserting his independance thing".

Tuesday night Noelle had to go in for a meeting for Grit Lit (Hamilton's literary festival, she's the co-chair, because with a three year old, a 7 month old, a husband who's often out of the country, and a small business to run, she felt there were some gaps in her schedule she needed to fill), and Isaac was going to have his own way that night.

Her leaving was fine, but putting him to bed, was another story entirely.

I won't bore you with the details, other than pointing out that Sam at 7 months is hitting his "Seperation Anxiety" right on target. So he really doesn't like to be left alone for any length of time. So bedtime on Tuesday was running back and forth between floors, to alternately console howling children.

And the worst part. I can't complain. At all. Even though I just did. I'm leaving in three weeks to spend another week in Managua. I am going to have to come back with a pretty significant bribe if we're going to get a whole week of good behaviour out of Isaac.

Meanwhile, Sam has a new thing he does. We know he likes his food. Alot. But he also likes your food, no matter what you're eating, no matter how impossible it would be for him to eat it with a baby mouth, and no teeth.

Let me explain. Did you ever have a friend in High School, or University who was terrible with money, but wanted to hang out and do the things everyone else did. So when you went to dinner, they would come, but they would order a glass of water. Then they would watch you eat, bite by bite, until you couldn't take it anymore, and you would offer to let them have some, and they would dig in like a lioness who has just given birth to a litter of 6?

That's the look Sam uses when you're eating, well, pretty much anything. He has huge blue/hazel eyes that stare up at you with the most sincere expression of "Where's mine?"

Don't get me wrong, I mean look at the photos, the kid's well fed. But he just always wants what we're eating. It's gotten to the point I can't snack around him. Which is probably just as well, as I do a little too much snacking anyway.

That's the news for now.