You Go My Home

The other morning Gigi said something to me that I didn’t quite catch. Gigi is a smart little cookie, but more like a dictionary than a linguistic genius. She memorizes every word that correlates with a noun or a verb, but trying to get her to make sentences has been a real struggle. So I got her to repeat what she had said and it was “You go my home.” Well, I am just delighted on so many levels with this sentence. She used home instead of house, which is awesome. She used the pronoun I instead of Gigi. Any she used the possessive pronoun “my,” which is really something you can’t teach, it’s just something she picked up. Yeah! Happy as I was, I didn’t really understand what she was trying to convey. Had I walked by her apartment the day before? Was she telling me her mom was inviting me to her birthday party? That’s happened before. Did she really want to come to my house? Was she going to Macau next weekend? I just didn’t understand and said something placating and moved on.
Throughout the rest of the day though, she would repeat “You go my home.” I finally told the Mandarin teacher about Gigi and her new sentence. And we laughed. She said she’d tell Gigi’s mom about it because it is so cute.
The end of the day comes along and Gigi’s name is called over the loud speaker signalling that her mom is here to pick her up. Gigi walks straight over to me with a purpose, takes my hand, pulls me toward the gate and repeats “You go my home.” I am so bowled over and so bemused that I just get dragged along. I tell the Mandarin teacher to watch the kids because apparently I’m leaving now because Gigi is not going to take No for an answer. Gigi drags me out to her mother. Her mother is confused. Gigi doesn’t say anything. I’m just laughing. I try and tell her mom what’s going on, but she doesn’t understand and seems a bit put off. I tell Gigi I can’t go home with her. She looks hurt. I tell her I’ll see her tomorrow. I go back in the school yard.
Gigi hasn’t ordered “You go my home” since.

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