Interaction with a Little Chinese Friend

I have said that during our stay in Beijing, Evan didn't have any kids his age to play with. But he did get to play with Yang Yang, the son of my high school classmate who just turned three when they came to visit.

Yang Yang is almost one year younger than Evan but talks more fluently and maturely. He is a live example of what I heard that the young kids in China seem to be more mature than the ones same age grow up in the states. They talk earlier and know a lot more probably because they have more interactions with people since they are born. I was interested to see how these two who don't speak the same language interact with each other.

Evan seemed very happy to see a little boy about his age coming to visit so he took one of his cars and handed it to Yang Yang. He told him in English that this was a car character in the movie "Cars" that we got at the McDonalds. Yang Yang took the car and looked at this mommy apparently he hadn’t seen that movie.

Yang Yang's mommy said to him: "楊楊, Evan 小哥哥聽不懂中文, 你跟他盡量說英文好嗎? 楊楊以後要好好學英文, 這樣以後才可以和Evan哥哥一起玩兒, 好不好?(Yang Yang, Evan doesn't understand Chinese, so could you please try to speak English to him? Yang Yang must try hard to study English so you can play Evan in the future, okay?)" Yang Yang answered very loudly: "好! 這是car (Okay! This is a car)".

I was quite surprised to hear a three-year old Chinese boy speaking English. Turned out barely three-year old Yang Yang had already registered and studied in an English class for a couple of months. He can recognize all 26 letters and knows some simple words.  Wow! A not even three year old already starts to learn English, when did I start to learn English again? The time has definitely changed! No wonder they say the Chinese parents are the ones who emphasize the education of their children the most. I was really impressed.

Well, the two boys played with each other for a little while, exchanged toys, tried to tell the other what the toy was about in their own languages. Yang Yang's mom did a great job translating whenever it was needed. It seemed to me not being able to understand what the other one was saying didn't really bother the boys. If one passed along a toy, the other would take it. If one pointed to something he wanted the other would give it to him until Yang Yang wanted an airplane and Evan's did not want to give it up even after Yang Yang tried asking in English. And that was it.

Overall, it was interesting to observe Evan and Yang Yang's interaction and like I did million times before, I made my resolution again: I will only speak Chinese to the kids after I get back to the states :).