Wimpy, Degonflé, BANANA! ;) (plus dork & moron)

My parents spoke French to each other a lot when I was growing up and after a while I understood quite a bit! (and I later learned French right before and during graduate school)

There are a few words that my parents always say in French because they think they conveys what they're thinking and meaning better than Portuguese. A big one is courant d'air (for a draught, wind coming from an opening window and blowing through the house) and another even "bigger" for them is gonflé (proud, "puffed up").

I was happily surprised to find out yesterday that the title for The Diary of a Wimpy Kid in French is Journal d'un degonflé!

Now, the title in Brazil makes lots of sense, but it's pretty derogatory, almost annoying: Diário de um banana !! :-) (a "banana" in Portuguese means a weak, useless person).

My oldest son (he'll be 11 in a week, isn't that crazy?) is a huge bookworm and he has read all the books (except for the 7th) a long time ago, but my youngest (who is 8.5) had never been interested in them... until now!

He is a good reader, but very particular in his tastes. Despite the fact that he's perfectly capable of reading longer chapter books, he's been sticking to reading and re-reading his beloved Berenstain Bears books and a Boxcar Children book once in a while.

Last Sunday he spent hours reading the first Wimpy Kid  book and he has been re-reading various passages ever since. And today I realized that this reading had unexpected consequences.

My very sheltered and innocent son had never encountered the words dork and moron before, but now he knows them. :(  He obviously knows not to use them, but I guess a new "universe" has now opened up for him, he's no longer my naive baby -- which is normal, I know. But still, hearing your child say "What does dork mean?" "What is a moron?" is not fun.

Good thing their school (K-8, small, private) and his classmates are nothing like those he's reading about. Phew!

Have you/your kids read this books? What do you think of them? At this point, I value reading so much that I'll have my sons read whatever will get them excited about reading. Hopefully it won't harm them too much. ;)