Pork Chop, Please! PDF

Pork Chop, Please! Pork Chop, Please! by Betsy Loredo Esperanza desperately wanted to have a good time....

Pork Chop, Please! Pork Chop, Please! by Betsy Loredo Esperanza desperately wanted to have a good time. She was at a birthday party for Tío Aurelio, after all. During his visits to her old home in Mexico City, he had quickly become her favorite uncle. He always told so many jokes! Today, like always, his big laugh filled the room as he greeted his guests. Some of the guests were relatives there from Spain, and others were relatives from Mexico, like Esperanza. Many guests were friends he'd met in the U.S., who spoke only English. As he weaved his way around the room, her uncle had a friendly word for everyone. Esperanza heard him slip between English and Spanish as easily as a door swinging open between two rooms. She sighed. Esperanza and her parents had just arrived in the United States, and were planning to stay there for good. Her English classes wouldn't begin for weeks. Esperanza had already begun studying the new language on her own, but after a few days, she felt like she'd learned nothing. Esperanza always was a top student, and she knew she was smart. But that wasn't how she felt. In Spanish, esperanza meant 'hope.' Right now, though, Esperanza felt hopeless. Seeing her sad face, Aurelio rushed over to give Esperanza a hug. "How's my favorite niece?" he asked her in Spanish. Esperanza sighed again. Both languages sounded wonderful in his low, growly voice, but she only understood him when he spoke Spanish. "You're so good at talking in English!" Esperanza replied in her native language. "I'll never, ever be able to speak English like that." Aurelio's laugh boomed out. "Let me tell you a little story," he began. When he first arrived in the U.S., Aurelio said, he lived with family friends, people he had never met before. Aurelio knew no one else in the city and no English at all. "I felt very alone," he remembered, "and for a whole week, I did not understand one word anyone said to me." ReadWorks.org · © 2023 ReadWorks®, Inc. All rights reserved.  Pork Chop, Please! Then, one day, he went to a diner. As Aurelio waited for a table, he puzzled over the menu that he could not read. How could he order? "Then I heard a man at the counter step up and order... " Aurelio put on a funny, fussy voice. He said loudly in English: "Pork chop, please!" Aurelio continued in Spanish. "Well, I sat right down at the counter, too. Can you guess what I said?" Esperanza started to smile. "Pork chop, please!" he repeated in the same silly voice. "Tío," Esperanza said between giggles, "that's English! You didn't know what you ordered?" Her uncle nodded. "True. Of course, when it came, I knew. ¡Chuleta de cerdo!" The next day, Aurelio told her, he went back to the diner. And the day after that. Each time, he ordered with the only English words he knew. "Pork chops. Every day. For THREE WEEKS!" her uncle said, snorting with laughter. "Oh, I grew so tired of them." "Still, all those weeks, I was studying," her uncle added, when they both stopped giggling. "One day, I was able to order something new, and not long after that, I could order any dish I wanted." He smiled kindly at his niece, who grinned back at her favorite uncle. "Learning just takes time," he said, giving her another hug. "I believe you can do it, Esperanza." For the first time, Esperanza believed it, too. She felt hope. ReadWorks.org · © 2023 ReadWorks®, Inc. All rights reserved.