"Sige, 'tol"

Roughly translated, "OK, bro'," which is usually how J ends his calls. It wouldn't have been too funny if the kids didn't pick this up.

The other night, J was tinkering with his new phone. His old unit was sitting on the table; we really didn't mind that A was playing around with it. It didn't have a working SIM card loaded, so we weren't worried about her making expensive long distance calls by accident. I knew she was pretending to be talking on the phone when she left the living room to go to D's room.

After a while, D went to the living room laughing out loud. A was following her, all the while looking sheepish. As per D's story, A went over to her and said, "D, Amber wants to talk to you...(then back to the phone) Sige, 'tol."

Funnier still, at least for me, was that D used to do the same when she was around A's age. There was even a time, she would call J's friends "'pare" because that was how J calls them. It's amazing how much you can learn about yourself watching your kids play. I've learned to change my approach on different things after I've seen them imitate me while they're at play. I must admit, it hasn't always been good. I have seen myself in A when she "preaches" to her dolls with her hands on her waist. Or when D pretends to be "mom" and gets all crazy because one of the dolls didn't finish it's "food."

But then again, there must be something with that specific age. Long before I had D, we had my niece B stay with us for a month. She was around 3 at that time, too. Around the same period, one of my dad's friends always dropped by the house. Common sight was that the friend, Ninong P would knock at the gate, my dad, upon seeing Ninong P, would raise an arm in a wave and say, "O, 'pare!" while walking towards the gate to open it. One weekend, we brought B with us to hear mass. It was a small chapel, my dad was very active with the church then and we personally knew the priest. My dad was friends with the people organizing the mass, too, so while waiting for the priest to arrive, they were just talking. After a while, someone alerted us to the arriving priest, "Andyan na yung pari." Everyone stood up to get things ready, while little B walked over to where the priest would be coming in, waved her little arms and said, "O, 'pare!"