Page 10 - My Mom Speaks Broken English: My Lingustic Identity; Language and Literacy Project, UWRT 1103

My father seemed thoughtful for a moment, and then
nodded. “Yes. I think that your classmates will enjoy
those ones.”

I looked at my father in excitement. I could already
imagine how cool my friends would think I was, listening
to the stories that I had heard since I was a child. That
night, I went to bed picturing all of my classmates’ amazed
faces in response to stories from my culture.

The morning of his guest appearance, my father and I
walked into my classroom hand-in-hand, my head held
high and chest filled with pride for my heritage. I was
ready for my friends to be astounded by father’s stories,
tales describing a world so different from their own.

Soon, it was time for my father to speak, and I sat
eagerly in the back of the classroom.

My teacher gave a brief introduction. “Class, this is
Chiamaka’s father. He has come to speak to all of you
about his own experiences in Nigeria, one of the countries
that we have discussed in class. Please give him your
attention.”

After this, my father took his place at the front of the
classroom and began to speak.

He began by talking of his hometown in Owerri,
Nigeria, regaling my class of the stories that I had listened
to since I was a child. He spoke about how he had never
seen a giraffe or an elephant until he visited an American
zoo, and how he, in fact, had never swung from tree to tree

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