AAroooba! That’s how the locals say it.
August 21-22nd, 2008. In no particular order, here are some observations of Aruba.
When you listen to local ads and local television, as an English speaker you can’t understand much. Aruba has a unique language known as “Papiamento,” a combination of Dutch, Spanish, English, and Portuguese. If that didn’t make it hard enough to understand, the pronunciation from one language is often applied to another. However, if you know a little Spanish you can often get the jist of what’s being said.
For example – when we rode in the “tow truck” after we got stuck in the sand, the guys in the car were commenting on the attractiveness of this woman we were driving by. I didn’t understand every word, but I understood enough (Sara did too and she wasn’t that impressed). The same goes for a lot of signs in Papiamento. The coffee shop we found in the local’s mall (the shop was known as HuChada) had quite a few want ads and posters on the wall facing the wi-fi area. I looked at quite a few ads on the wall (like people selling puppies, cars, job opportunities, etc.) and the words made a little sense.
Still, reading signs and listening to advertisements is nothing like listening to people speak (especially without a context). I’m not going to lie – I often had no idea what was being said.
For example, listening to the local radio talk shows was odd and hard to comprehend. Not only was everyone speaking Papiamento, but the people talked over a song being played in the background. It wasn’t like they shouted over the music – the music volume would be normal, then drop to background noise as the people spoke, the raise again to normal.
Imagine someone turning the car radio knob up and down between each word of a conversation, and you get the drift.
People on the radio in Aruba say “AAAAAroooooooba!!” – it’s much more fun to say than “Aruba.” Try it – I’ll wait.
Fun, right?
This week has been a work week for the most part. We went to the Radisson Hotel pool again and waited for our friends “Jill and Brad” today, and Sara’s done a nice job of going out and running at sunset. Tomorrow, we head to DePalm Island which is supposed to have great snorkeling.
