A Smile in any Language
11 a.m.
There are nine toddlers and preschoolers with their moms and dads crowded into the pre-surgery playroom and little Vu, Tam and Long start to wail — which is contagious and the entire room joins in. In attempts to calm them, I start singing and clapping - but only know the words to American baby tunes. I then continue language play and demonstration, pointing out pictures such as “ca” for fish and “ga” chicken. I see all the quizzical looks on the children’s faces, and then the parent burst out laughing, breaking the tension of all the crying hungry babies. I was pointing to “ca”, but calling it a ship or an eggplant, depending on what tone of voice I used, and that when I said “ga” for chicken I was “giving the children permission to get married.” The children laugh and try to correct my speech, and for each attempt at “ga” or “ca” I am saying something else because there are 6 tones in Vietnamese, and each one means a totally different thing. I then ask one “ma” for help and she collapses in a fit of laughter as I had just pointed to her and said “ma”, which meant “ghost” by the way I said it. We have a babbling war: I speak, and then the entire room shouts out the correct sound and inflections. I fail miserably at each attempt, but that only adds to their amusement.
I abandoned all attempts to be a good language model!! We put on a baby concert, parents clapping and children laughing at me and my silly baby songs - which they start to sing using only my sounds “babab”…”dadad”…”gagag”. We switch to Vietnamese baby songs and do a parade around the room banging sticks and clapping hands. My voice is hoarse, and squeaks out my warped Vietnamese. I recruit Tam’s mother to be my speech assistant, and she models the rest while I gesture. They get the point, in any language!
6 pm.
I have given out the last smile bag, and blown the last bubble, uttered my last “baba”, for the day…given out my last therapy kit, and made sure the last patient’s family had their provisions of dried noodles and juice. The playroom/pre-surgery area is a disaster area, and the carnage of paper, crayons, puzzles pieces, and blocks are strewn across the room. A lone mother wanders in, and begs for the scraps of paper and few broken crayons for her children to keep them occupied until their ride arrives tomorrow, as the floods have all receded and she can go home. I smile and grab a brand new pack of crayons from my stash and two bright coloring books and hand them to her. Her eyes well with tears and she grabs my hands, bobs her head, and then hugs me. What could be so simple?
I don’t have time to finish this blog - we are headed for our last day of surgery… we will have completed at LEAST 120 surgeries and provided new smiles despite the floods and rain by the end of this day. I will rely on gesture language today since my voice is gone, but rest assured new voices and smiles will find their “Hue” in the hearts of all of us and in the children of Vietnam!
Tam Biet to all!
- Cathy Snyders, Operation Smile volunteer