Assimilating?

Our family has had a tradition the last few years of going out to eat for breakfast on New Years Day. This morning we continued that tradition.

First though we had to drive around for about 45 minutes to find a place that served breakfast. Middle Easterners are not big breakfast people. Our kids say that at school the other kids are shocked that our kids actually eat breakfast before they come to school. Most of the other kids eat breakfast during "1st break."

We drove by some coffee/donut shops that were open but had trouble finding a place with real American breakfast food. Even the McDonalds' here don't serve breakfast so even that wasn't an option. Finally we remembered Crumz serves breakfast so that's where we ended up.

When our orders came the waiter was handing out the plates of food and as he'd pick up a new plate, he'd announce what was on the plate so we could tell him who ordered that particular food. Probably hard to keep track of what 9 different people ordered. So when he said "Pancakes?" Red responded with "Ana. Ana."

I (still being a non-Arabic speaker) didn't really know why Red said that but I didn't think much about it because I was busy making sure everyone got what they were supposed to get. Later Todd asked if I realized what Red had said.

Turns out "ana" is the Arabic word for "me." So Red (5 years old) is picking up the lingo of the natives. Good for him, I say.