A note on languages: We're mostly Arabic-only

Although I translate Basbusa's comments for the purposes of this blog, she actually speaks Arabic, since that's the only language we use with her at this point.

My own first language is English, and although I enjoyed the various languages I studied at school at various points, I didn't start learning Arabic until my senior year of college. After a bunch of studying, a whole lot of immersion in Arabic-only environments, a master's degree, a husband who spoke no English when I met him, and a job focused on translating Arabic newspapers, I'm now fluent (more or less) in Egyptian Arabic. My husband didn't start learning English until a few years ago.

Since we're living in the US, we're speaking only Arabic with Basbusa (if/when we move back to Egypt, I'll switch over to English-only). She gets exposure to English from my parents and sister, and, as she gets older, from the whole rest of the world around her, I'm sure!