Friday Night and Phoque Mittens

Language is a funny and strange thing; especially here in Kuujjuaraapik. I am constantly flipping from English to French to my limited Inuttitut vocabulary. What I use when is completely dependent on who I am speaking with and in what context. This leads me into a funny little incident that happened on Friday night where my brain tuned out and I became linguistically challenged.

Friday night, Guerlaine had a wine and apple themed party. She generally has a few of these each month and each has a specific theme. People are welcome to drop by between 5 and 7pm. She is a planner and she picks up what she will need in advance when she visits home in Montreal. She is the coordinator for the Inuit daycares along the Hudson Coast so she travels a lot. Her husband is James, the Youth Worker in town, and they have a beautiful son named Gabriel. Her generosity is great and she invites everyone which is refreshing.

After the party Friday, Amanda, Noel, and Joey (a teacher from the Cree School) went to the restaurant to have dinner. We didn't really need more food after Guerlaine's but we had planned it earlier in the week so we decided to go anyway. The regular French gang from my school was there and we chatted a bit. As they were leaving, Carole (the principal's wife) came over and she had these beautiful long leather mittens that she had bought when they lived in Inukjuak. I told her I wanted them and she replied by saying she would bring me her 'phoque mittens'. Now most of us know that phoque means seal in French and normally, so do I; but for one split second, I only concentrated on the phoque part and then I heard mittens. For some reason, I couldn't put the two of them together. I genuinely asked, "Why the hell are fuck mittens?" It was then that Amanda and Joey (incredulously) pointed out that she meant seal mittens. That phoque was seal. I was slightly confused for a second and then realized my mistake. I laughed and laughed. How could I have not gotten that?

This goes to show you that no matter what you know and how long you have known it, it still can be 'misplaced' in our linguistic data banks. I just thought I would share this one:)

The countdown begins...26 days till Christmas vacation...