We watch a lot of Dora the Explorer in our house. Strangely enough, there are quite a few TV viewing options for our two-year old. And most of them are quite cultural. Right now Gracie's watching a cute little Chinese-American girl called Kai-lan. Her catchphrase is "Ni Hao!", which Gracie has translated to the much easier Meow! Both Dora and Kai-lan subtly introduce their native languages to two-year olds all over the world.
My favorite Dora quote came from our good friend Jeremy: "Ah Dora, converting the world to Spanish one word at a time." Classic!
All this culture however, is not without its side effects. The other night while we were eating dinner, Gracie demanded to have more juice. Her daddy said, "what's the magic word?" because we're really trying for the manners thing... Gracie didn't even have to think about this one; she promptly and quite proudly announced: "abra!"
Abra? It took us a few minutes, but we finally figured it out... Dora has an episode where she has to ask a rock to open it's door. The storyline refers to abra as the magic word to open the doors. Mystery solved.; the magic word really is abra!
The more I think about it, abra really is a magic word. I often catch myself humming that Michael W. Smith standard Open the Eyes of my Heart. I think God would say that abra is a great word: just think back to VBS as a kid and the great Rev 3:20 verse "Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me."
I remember being quite young when I opened that door and my prayer today is that I always obey when God whispers "abra por favor."
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