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Raising bilingual kids, an interim report
Published 13. September 2018

Raising bilingual kids, an interim report

When we had our kids, we swore we were going to write down everything cute or smart that they said. Every parent says this. But then they started saying so many cute and smart things and we were so busy with the actual parenting part of parenting that we just forgot. Which is unfortunate because, since we raised bilingual kids, they were saying twice as many cute and smart things, and sometimes even on purpose. But we remembered a few.

First off, we always sent them to bi-lingual daycares and schools, and we did that each-parent-exclusively-speaks-their-native-tongue method of bilingual child-rearing. Some academic has probably given it a better name but that’s what I call it: The each-parent-exclusively-speaks-their-native-tongue method of bilingual child-rearing. I spoke English to our kids and my German wife spoke German. I was, ahem, a fascist about it and never broke character. I found it difficult in small groups, like on playgrounds, because I’d be explaining something to my kids in English while some random German kid would stare at me dumbfounded. I would then translate it to German, which always felt super-pretentious.

But, like I said, I was being a fascist about it. Any time they spoke to me in German I would even say, “I don’t understand you” or the now-ridiculous sounding, “How does dad say it?” And they would always then switch to English. Because they’re the most awesome kids on the planet. Still, every time I told them I didn’t understand their German, I expected them to look at me dumbfounded and say, “Dad, I know you understand my German because I just heard you explain to that kid in German that the plastic dumptruck is mine but the pink starfish sand form was already on the playground when we got there.” But they never did. They believed us so wholeheartedly that when they wanted to tell us both something they would first say it in one language and then the other – a habit they still have as teenagers.

Truly bilingual kids

One night, I came in to find my wife and daughter sitting at the kitchen table. My daughter was about four at the time. I said something to her and she started laughing so hard that tears started to run down her cheeks. My wife and I looked at each other confused. “Mama!” she said to my wife. “Papa spricht deutsch mit mir!” (Dad’s speaking German with me!). I’d been at the beergarden and had probably stayed a bit too long. I switched to English and we all three laughed. We’re still laughing.

Another time we were on vacation in Italy with friends who have two sons. Our friends are Croatian and American but they live in Amsterdam, which means their two sons speak Dutch, English and Croatian. Yes, fluently. Our kids understood that the two boys were multi-lingual but my daughter couldn’t understand that they didn’t speak German.

“Hey,” my wife said to her. “They’re like the kids in your daycare and speak several languages but you have to speak English to them or they won’t understand.”

“I know,” my daughter said. “Just like the kids in the daycare.” And she continued to speak German with them. The odd part was that she would always speak English to their parents. My friend’s sons are nice, caring kids but it frustrated them that they would speak English to her and she would answer in German. So they just started speaking Croatian to her.

She finally switched.

In addition to anecdotes, there were vocabulary oddities. Only recently have my kids started saying “sleepovers”. For years they just anglicized the German übernachten: Overnighting. And they still don’t own any stuffed animals — they’re all cuddle toys (Kuscheltiere). I thought more of it would disappear during two years in Portland but in addition to the cuddle toys and overnighting, they also still ask if something “tastes”. Not “tastes good” or “tastes bad”, just “tastes”. Because in German, if something “tastes” it means it tastes good – you don’t need the adjective. But if it tastes bad, you need a whole sentence – “Es schmeckt mir nicht!” (It doesn’t taste to me!). My son would also like an English equivalent of “und so weiter” (and so on) in English when he doesn’t know how to end a story. Lately he’s started saying, “and whatsoever”, which is close.

But the funniest thing he ever said was one day when I was being a goofy dad, rough housing with him. He was laughing and laughing and said, “Dad! You’re spinning!” Because in German, acting crazy is a single verb: Spinnen as in, Papa, du spinnst!

There, now I’ve written down some of the cute and smart things my kids said.

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Published 4. January 2017

This is how you beat the Zollamt

Ah, Christmastime in Germany. Glühwein. Adventkalendars. And at least one trip to the Zollamt (customs office) to retrieve seized packages. I always enjoy the Zollamt because of a luxury unique to Germany: The ability to have heated arguments with armed government officials without ending up in jail.

Or the hospital.

The argument-with-a-cop thing is something I discovered after living in Berlin for a year when a German friend shouted his way out of a ticket from a tubby Polizist. It was like the cop was even thankful to have a discussion.

Every visit to the Zollamt starts with a letter saying they’ve seized a package and suspect the contents may exceed the €45 limit on gifts sent from abroad. A bit rude and presumptuous, really. They then invite you to stop by for a chat to retrieve your package.

Zollamt Berlin
This is an old picture of the place but it still looks like this.

The Zollamt in Berlin is a mid-sized warehouse sandwiched into a No Man’s Land between a sketchy corner of Schöneberg and the northern tip of Friedenau, a borough no one’s ever heard of. The Hauptadt’s Bielefeld, if you will. It’s filled with vanilla customs officials whose dream in life is to catch a 21-year-old student trying to sneak a cut-rate iPhone into the country via Deutsche Post without paying sales tax or duties.

You’d think a customs officer would want to break up an international poaching ring or discover 1,200 tons of cocaine hidden in a teal teddy bear but you’d be wrong. They want to pop Kai from Heidelberg with his hands in the customs cookie jar.

And they suspect everyone called to their place of work of being Kai from Heidelberg.

On my last visit there, I was paired with a dour customs officer convinced she was facing her daily Kai. I knew I was anything but. Every year, German customs seizes packages filled with gifts from my stepmother for my kids. And every year I leave smiling without paying a dime because I know something the Zollamt is incapable of learning: My stepmother knows international law in deep detail. Not because she wants to exploit it, but because she’s so fearful of breaking it.

Every one of those packages contains less than €45 worth of gifts, which is also a great reason to limit your spending on your grandkids.

The customs official met me as I entered the rear warehouse and pushed my stepmother’s package at me across the steel counter.

“What’s in here?” She asked.

“Gifts for my kids from my parents.” I always like to throw the kid thing in there. I like to hint that they’re harming the bond between child and grandparent. That they’re trying to take something from my children. Like they’d even take candy from a baby. Because they would, actually, if it wasn’t declared and exceeded €45.

“We’ll see about that,” she said, going on the offensive. “Please open it.”

At this point they hand you the box and an industrial box cutter, which seems odd. Customs officials are armed, presumably because dangerous people end up there. And the first thing they do is hand you a weapon.

And I always want to say: “You’re the one so eager to see what’s in it – you open it.” But there’s probably some goofy legal reason they’re not allowed to even though they’ve probably x-rayed it, which is little different.

Ok, someday I’ll say it. Actually, no I won’t.

I opened the box and pulled out the gifts. My stepmother no longer wraps them because every one of her packages gets seized. Every. Single. One. I get to wrap them.

The customs official quickly grabbed a paint-by-numbers set in a futuristic packaging. You know, the kind of thing your mother might buy at Safeway to shut you up while she tries to pick out a cantaloupe.

“A-ha!,” the customs officer said, “What do we have here? Electronics?”

“It’s a gift for my daughter. Paints, not electronics,” I offered. The kid thing again. I’m ruthless.

“I’m going to look it up,” she said accusingly. She clearly thought my stepmother and I were locked in a conspiracy to smuggle paint-by-numbers sets. She grabbed the toy and headed to her desk. This woman would not only take candy from a baby, she’d make the baby unwrap it first.

This is what the Zollamt – the arm of the German government tasked with protecting Europe’s most populous country from nefarious and illegal shipments – does to determine the price of presents: Checks Amazon. Really. They do it so much Amazon should charge a commission.

I watched with joy as the woman discovered the non-value of the toy and returned to the counter.

Next, she grabbed a winter coat which, granted, could push the value of the shipment above the limit. That is, had the package been sent by anyone but my stepmother.

“What do we have here?” she said, accusingly again.

“A jacket for my son,” I said. Who would be so cruel as to deny a growing boy a jacket during a Berlin winter? This woman, that’s who.

She inspected the coat and smiled. Villains always smile.

“There’s no price tag on here! I think we all know why there’s no price tag!”

She thought she had her Kai. She grabbed the coat and moved back to her desk for a little Amazoning.

“You’re right,” I said. “We do know why there’s no price tag – or have you never received a present?”

This sounds rhetorical but at that point it seemed a possibility.

“Of course I have,” she mumbled. I knew I was nearing victory.

Her colleague must have sensed her impending defeat. He stepped in to help: “Why don’t you go wait in the waiting room and we’ll check the value of the shipment? We’ll call you when we’re ready,” he said.

I only had to wait a few minutes. When I was called back into the warehouse the first customs official had disappeared and the remaining officers were seated at their desks. The box had been repacked and was deserted on the counter.

“You guys done with your Internet research? Can I go?” I was probably smiling.

“Yes,” the officer said. He didn’t even look at me.

“Merry Christmas,” I said as I left.

Silence.

What’s the value of triumphing over German bureaucrats (with guns!)? It’s just an extra gift my stepmother throws in every Christmas.

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Published 28. October 2016

This is milkrice

One day when I was an exchange student my guest mother asked me if I liked Milchreis. I didn’t translate that to show non-German speakers how I felt when faced with that question. Milchreis? I’m pretty sure I knew at the time that Milch was milk and Reis was rice but I had not a clue that the two fit together in any sentence that wasn’t a shopping list.

Milkrice?

Then she handed me a tiny plastic container that looked like tapioca pudding. It was cinnamon and sugar Milchreis (from Müllermilch, of course) and my life changed. I had the second Nutella Moment of my life. A Nutella Moment is something I just made up but it’s when you taste something new and think: This exists in the world and you’re only telling me about it now? Because you know you’ll be enjoying it until your tastebuds die and the only thing you get any pleasure out of is super-hot sriracha, served with a bib and a straw.

German milk rice

For the uninitiated, milkrice is rice that’s been steeped in milk, rather than steamed or steeped with water. A German risotto, if you will. But instead of broth and white wine you steep it in milk and sugar and vanilla and cinnamon. Then you serve it with more sugar or fruit of some kind and spend the rest of the day smiling. Probably steaming hot but maybe cold because there was some left over from when you made it yesterday and who’s going to wait to warm that up?

It tastes like a dessert but you feel like you ate something healthy because: rice.

You can use the same Arborio rice you would use for risotto. But uncooked milkrice rice in Germany is way cheaper than Arborio rice so cooks-in-the-know in Germany just use milkrice rice for both milkrice and risotto.

I just saved you a bunch of money. You’re welcome.

Your grandmother’s milkrice

I ate about one Müllermilch Milchreis a week during my early days in Germany until my kids were old enough to like it and my wife said: “It can’t be that hard to make. My grandmother used to make it” and decided to make some. That logic doesn’t actually work because If grandmothers made it, it usually means it’s super-hard to make unless you’re a grandmother but it turned out milkrice really isn’t difficult.*

And my wife then launched a series of superlative, home-made milkrices. It’s now our family’s comfort food.

I know what you’re thinking: That’s just rice pudding! No. No it’s not. Rice pudding involves eggs and maybe cream and raisins and gooey, pre-cooked rice and nobody likes it except Old Lady Wiggins, and nobody likes her.

But there is at least one hidden danger in milkrice. Some enterprising cooks at my kids’ school in Berlin thought the magic of milkrice could carry over to other dishes. They served Milchnudeln (milknoodles), as if it were a thing. The magic doesn’t carry over and it isn’t a thing and my kids came home starving that day. I’ve never tried them but my kids (trustworthy on all things food) said Milchnudeln are as disgusting as they sound.

Luckily the cooks never tried Milchfisch or maybe Milchsteak but we started making their lunches for them shortly after that experiment just in case.

I decided to write this post the other day after my son asked me to make him Milchreis for his school lunch. I figured the magic of milkrice had already made its way to Portland, Oregon.

“Who else gets milkrice for lunch?”

“Nobody at school’s ever heard of it,” he said.

But now you have.

 

*Basic milk rice

1 cup Arborio (or milkrice) rice, 1 liter milk, a cinammon twig, a packet of vanilla sugar, maybe some salt. Bring to a boil. Steep on low for 10 minutes, then cover and let sit for half an hour. Then e-mail Drew and thank him.

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Published 16. September 2016

Why Germans hate male babies

I always felt like Germany cultivates a culture of intellectualism while America … well we like hamburgers.

Nowhere did I see this more than when my wife was pregnant.

When we were awaiting our second child – our son – my German friends began to act strange.

“We’re having a boy,” I would say.

“Oh,” my German friends would say with alarm. “Poor you.” Some hugged me as if to say: It’s going to be all right. We’ll get through this too.

Strange, right?

german babies
Both have opinions on your unborn child.

I never had any idea what they were talking about. But they said it so openly, so confidently, that I couldn’t profess ignorance. The way they said it, it sounded like all of Germany knew having a boy was a bad thing. Except me. I started to wonder if Germany was the anti-China. Girls only, bitte.

I was afraid that my ignorance of the pitfalls of boys would reflect poorly on me. So I didn’t admit I didn’t understand. I just said, “I know, right?” And changed the subject.

But I was prepared for this reaction because it’s the way a certain kind of American and Brit reacts to news that you’re having a daughter, which we did, right before we had a son.

“A daughter, huh?” Americans would say shortly after meeting me and hearing I was expecting a daughter. “Poor you.” Unlike my German friends, they didn’t hug me.

But poor me.

The assumption here is that I would suffer as my little girl grew up and became a woman and started having boyfriends and – gasp – sex. As if your daughter enjoying a cornerstone of the human experience is the worst thing. Ever.

The implication is that fathers have to protect their daughters and make their choices for them, while teaching their sons to be strong humans capable of making all the good and bad decisions on their own.

You know: sexism. Yuck.

German babies

I prefer instead to teach both of my children to be strong, confident people capable of making both good and bad decisions, just like other humans. Though, to be honest, I hope they make a few fewer bad decisions than I did. Like not having Steak Frites on Kurfürstendamm after a bucket of popcorn at the French cinema. You lose your gall bladder with decisions like that.

And they probably should decide against seeing Hangover 2 (come on, you know you liked Hangover).

So, in a way, I was ready when suddenly my German friends started acting the same way about my soon-to-be son. Poor me. Except I had no idea what they were talking about.

It happened so often that I decided I had to stop faking as if I knew. When my German documentary filmmaker friend – a leftist intellectual with little equal – made the same statement, I dropped my guard.

“What are you talking about?” I asked him between bands at White Trash Fast Food. And then I told him the story about Americans and daughters. He was repulsed.

“Nothing like that,” he said. “The Freud thing.”

“Oh, right,” I said.

No idea what he meant.

Luckily my generation invented this thing called Google and when I got home I put in “Freud son father” and was horrified at what the Germans were warning me about. You see, it’s Oedipus. It’s always Oedipus with these Germans.

In order to fulfill his mother fantasy, Oedipus had to kill his father. Germans (and Freud and even Jung, I discovered) extrapolate this on to the human condition to mean that a boy can’t become a man until he replaces his father in the world. Germans were trying to warn me that my son would become a murderer. And me, a murder victim.

What?

Either way, people shouldn’t be warning anybody about the sex of their baby, though a warning or two about babies as a species is certainly warranted. Anyone who’s ever had one – or shared an airplane with one – knows what I’m talking about.

Poor me indeed!

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Published 9. September 2016

I was stunned at German math

When my kids finally started going to school in Berlin, I learned something I had always suspected: Germans can do witchcraft. They are experts in the black arts and can summon the spirits any time numbers are involved. When I sat down to help my kids with their math homework, my world changed. Inexorably. Forever.

It was so earth-shattering that I can’t even put it into words. So I made a video.

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Published 3. June 2016

How to parent like a German, Ep. 1

German kids have to go outside for an hour every day.

One hour. Every day.

I may have misunderstood biology class but I think it has something to do with photosynthesis, like Germans have more chlorophyll than everyone else. Also I’m pretty sure it’s part of the Grundgesetz (German constitution). Germans don’t even question this. It’s a total normal part of raising kids in Germany, like feeding them, clothing them and regretting having them.

Back when my kids were little, if it started getting late in the day and they hadn’t been outside, my German wife would start getting panicky as if she were Cinderella and it was 11: 59 p.m. (that’s 23:59 to Germans).

“Hase, meinst du, du kannst mit den nur eine Stunde um den Block gehen?” she would ask (“Honey, do you think you can walk around the block with them for an hour?”). And I would, because I’m always worried she’ll see her mistake in marrying me so I try to keep her happy.

Plus: Love.

Also: I didn’t want to see my kids turn into pumpkins.

German kids have to go outside for an hour every day.

My kids and I would always end up on one of two playgrounds, swinging and sliding in blackness with a few other dads.

“Married a German?” we’d ask each other.

“Yup.”

Parenting like a German

I sound like I’m deriding it here but I’m not: Kids do need to be outside for an hour every day, regardless of the weather. It seems to air out their tiny brains. It’s like rebooting them after you opened too many windows in their browser inside. It’s such an obvious truth that they’re trying to  institute it in America now too, via our equivalent to the German constitution: Professional football.

The must-go-outside thing doesn’t stop when kids go to daycare either. German daycare teachers are expected to make sure the kids get their hour of sunlight per day too. And daycare teachers are happy to oblige because they know a secret: Kids are way easier to deal with when they’re outside. Especially when they’re outside and on the far side of the playground.

This often leads to two or three hours of outside time for daycare kids every day, which ingratiates the teachers even more to the parents and allows the teachers even more time to Snapchat.

Through this requirement I discovered that I do better with some outside time every day too. Maybe I got some chlorophyll with my German DNA.

 

 

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Published 27. May 2016

How I made my kids bilingual

*This post was originally published in German over at Frau-Mutter, a great blog about mothering in German. And by that I mean both mothering in the language of German and mothering by being German. Also, she happens to be in Germany, so all bases covered.

We raised our kids bilingually. All the recommendations we read said each parent should speak their native language with the kids and the kids would learn the languages naturally. One language per parent. Our kids only have two parents so they were limited to just the two languages – German and English. I’m American. My wife is German.

Even though I speak pretty good German, it never occurred to me to want to communicate with my children in anything other than my native language. Mostly because my kids are half-German and I knew what would ultimately happen if I tried German with them.

Eventually we’d be having a simple discussion and my daughter would stop me mid-sentence and roll her teen-age eyes.

“Dad, Jesus,” she’d say. “Your German is so embarrassing. It’s dative. It’s ‘dem’ not ‘den’.” And then I’d lose the argument and I’d have to buy her an Xbox after all.

Just because I conjugated incorrectly.

 

bilingual kids

We have two kids. I spoke only English with them. Every time they said something to me in German I’d say, “I don’t understand. How would you say it in English?” I always felt guilty because I did understand them and – you may not believe this – but we have the two smartest, cutest kids ever. Yes, smarter and cuter than your kids. So it was hard to act like I didn’t understand them.

But I did it anyway. And I kept waiting for them to call my bluff.

“Come on Dad,” I thought they’d say, “We just heard you and mom talking about the merits of laser vs. pulse propulsion in German. I’m sure you understood me asking to be pushed on the swings.”

But they never did. They always believed I never understood them and answered in English. Like I said, they’re the best kids. Ever.

When my daughter was five I read a piece about bilingualism in kids. It said parents should speak in their native tongue because using a second language robs parents of spontaneity. True. Plus it’s also easier to yell in your native language.

There’s other problems with not speaking your native language with your kids.

Making kids bilingual

My kids have always been in bilingual schools and nurseries in Berlin. Many of the kids have German helicopter parents who think it’s vital their kids grow up bilingual even though both parents are German. These parents also follow the mantra of one parent, one language. That means that I’ve been subjected every day to adult Germans trying to speak to their children in English with German accents.

Respect for the parents for knowing a second language but not with their kids. In English, the parents sound like a mix of Boris Karlov and Ariana Huffington speaking to a cardboard box full of kittens. That may work on stage but imagine it in the cloakroom. Or on the playground. Or telling a kid to come sit on their lap.

Creepy.

We’ve even run into a few German parents that gave their kids English names even though they can’t pronounce them. For two years I thought a girl at our kids’ school was named Selma. It turned out her name was Thelma. Her parents couldn’t pronounce it.

I often thought the bi-lingualism would come in handy if I needed to say something in secret to my kids. Once, in the Rocky Mountains, we were in the changing room for a hot springs. A real cowboy walked in – cowboy boots, cowboy hat and giant belt buckle. Probably enough guns in his truck to arm a small Caribbean nation.

“Wow,” I said to my son in German. “I bet you didn’t expect to see one of those here.”

My son looked at me weird. “Dad, why are you speaking to me in German?”

The cowboy just laughed.

I never spoke German to him again.

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Published 28. April 2016

How to birthday like a German kid

Today is my daughter’s first birthday outside of Germany. She’s not happy. During the run-up it seemed like she might not even celebrate. We were worried she was going to hold a lonely wake instead.

But then my wife had an idea. Partly because, as I’ve discussed before, she’s a Jedi. But also because she’s a mother and making children happy is a special talent of moms. Like making sandwiches. Dads on the other hand – I’m not sure we really have any parental talents. Except maybe being the parent without parental talents.

“Why don’t you have a German-themed birthday?” my wife suggested to my daughter. It worked better than any Jedi Mind Trick ever. Though have Jedi Mind Tricks even been invented yet? (Note to self: E-mail George Lucas about first Jedi Mind Trick).

My daughter exploded with enthusiasm for her birthday. We’ve spent the last two weeks convincing her to not invite the entire seventh grade. At the moment, she’s a better German ambassador to the U.S. than Peter Wittig (Germany’s ambassador to the U.S., if you didn’t know. I didn’t.).

Beyond sausages, pretzels and Wagner, this is what her party will look like:

Topfschlagen (Pot Whacking)

topfschlagen - pot whacking - german kids birthday games

The point of this game is to find your prize. When it’s your turn, the prize already legally belongs to you but your friends want you to earn it. So they blindfold you and then hide your prize underneath an overturned pot. Seems mean – it’s your prize – but Germans define “mean” differently. They tuck the pot and prize off in a corner of either the yard or the living room, depending on the weather and the current mental state of the host parents. Next, you are given a wooden spoon. Your task is to get on all fours and divine the location of your prize by whacking the spoon against objects to find the pot.

Your friends help by bellowing “kalt!” (cold!) or “warm!” (warm, dummy) depending on your current trajectory and the location of the prize. Many wooden spoons, vases and parental shins have suffered during this game. But as of yet, everyone got their prize.

Schokolade Wettessen (Competition Chocolate Eating)

schokolade wettessen - competition chocolate eating - german kids birthday gamesI know, sounds like a Hunger Games the Oompa Loompas hold for kids who lose their way in the Chocolate Factory. But it’s not. First, a chocolate bar (preferably Milka) is wrapped up in newspaper and then kids crowd around a table. They take turns rolling a dice until someone gets a six. The sixer then has to put on adult winter gloves, a scarf and a winter hat and attempt to unwrap the chocolate with a knife and fork. Once unwrapped, the sixer can eat all the chocolate they can.

All the while the other kids continue to roll the dice. Should anyone hit a six, they then have to take the winter clothes and cutlery off the previous sixer and either continue unwrapping or eating the chocolate until the next six falls.

You’re right. Maybe the Oompa Loompas did invent it. Yes I know the band Veruca Salt got its name from the film.

Mumie Einwickeln (Wrap the Mummy)

mumie einwickeln - wrap the mummy - german kid birthday games

Up until I found out about this game I thought Germany was the most environmentally conscious country on the planet. I now realize they only do it to make up for playing this game.

Two teams of two face off in this game that requires one team member to wrap the other up in toilet paper. The winner is the team that entirely covers its mummy first. Not even a thought of the player can show through. The winning team gets a prize and the toilet paper gets discarded.

Though, to be honest, we may not allow this game this year because of the environmental concerns. And because toilet paper costs twice as much in America (really!). We may substitute it with Sackhupfen (Sack Race) or Der Plumpsack geht rum (Pass the Falling Bag), which sounds horrible in both languages but is just a modified version of Duck, Duck, Goose.

At the end of a German birthday each kid leaves with a gift bag full of treats and the parents get to begin another tradition of German kids’ birthday parties: Heavy drinking. It’s also a tradition we’ll be following here.

(Happy birthday kiddo)

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Published 26. April 2016

Nutella and peanut butter: The battle

Settle an old argument for me. My wife and I have fought about this since our youngest was a baby. It’s become a dispute bigger than the East Coast/West Coast beef in American rap or whether Didi Hallervorden or Fips Asmussen wrote the first-ever German one-liner. Think Kramer vs. Kramer.

It’s important I get this settled today because it’s our 13th wedding anniversary.

Nutella, peanut butter.
I know it’s my name, not Nutella but we all know what it is. Plus, cool that my name is on a Nutella jar.

It started when our first kid was just a year old. My wife offered her a Nutella-laden spot of Brötchen (bread roll).

“What are you doing?” I demanded. “Do you want to get her hooked on chocolate at this early of an age?”

My statement seemed to puzzle my wife. She looked at me as though I had suddenly turned into a cloud of semi-transparent gas that was whispering commands to her in a language never before heard in this solar system.  She didn’t know whether to laugh at the discovery of a talking gaseous mass or cry because she was obviously hallucinating.

“It’s just Nutella,” she said. “I’ve eaten it my entire life and look at me.” I don’t actually know if she said that “look at me” bit but it’s what I always hear when we talk food because I’m clearly the American in the relationship, if you know what I mean. I’m overweight, is what I’m saying.

She’s obviously the European.

“It’s chocolate and that’s a baby!” I hollered. Despite insisting that my kids carry both a blue and a red passport, I’ve inwardly always hoped that they would adopt their mother’s eating habits but get everything else from me. On that day, the half a square centimeter of Brötchen with a drop of Nutella was about to ruin that.

“It’s Nutella and I’ve eaten it my whole life (and look at me),” she said again. Then she leaned into her wife-of-an-American toolbox and said: “Plus, you were giving her peanut butter yesterday and there’s no difference.”

Which is where you come in. Have you ever heard anything so absurd? Me neither.

Nutella and peanut butter are in different galaxies. Peanut butter in its purest form is crushed peanuts – straight from the earth – mixed with a dash of salt. Ok, you might mix in some butter and two dashes of salt and the peanuts are actually roasted but that’s it. It’s food so pure Adam and Eve probably dined on it before partaking in a pomegranate. Neanderthals maybe even ate peanut butter and they weren’t capable of sin because all of that hadn’t been invented yet.

Peanut butter is pure and natural.

Nutella, on the other hand, was invented by an industrialized society trying to trick people into believing hazelnuts were chocolate. It worked! Nutella tastes great! But it’s a chocolate made by heavy machinery and should only be consumed for dessert or as a treat. Heavy machinery is nothing for babies or the main course.

I tolerate it on the breakfast table because I know an entire country would revolt if I expressed distaste but I don’t really believe that anyone – not even Germans – would believe that it’s the same thing as peanut butter.

“Honey,” I now often tell my daughter, “maybe one Brötchen half with Nutella is enough.” She’ll be a teenager soon but the Nutella poisoning took hold. She loves the stuff.

My wife will scowl at me across the breakfast table.

“So you get to have two or three Brötchen halves covered in peanut butter but she only gets to have a half with Nutella?”

It’s a wonder we’re still married.

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