Love You Too, Mummy Monster

Jin has a bedtime ritual that belongs entirely to the two of us. We pull the duvet up over our heads — all the way, until we're completely hidden from the world — and become blanket monsters. "잘 자요, 엄마 이불괴물." (Good night, mummy blanket monster.) "잘 자, 아가 이불괴물아." (Good night, baby blanket monster.) "사랑해, 아가 이불괴물아." (I love you, baby blanket monster.) "나도 사랑해요, 엄마 이불괴물." (I love you too, mummy blanket monster.) We trade these soft, silly words back and forth until her breathing slows and she drifts off to sleep.

Last night, I switched to English. "Love you, baby blanket monster." She didn't pause. Didn't ask what I meant. Just answered, warm and certain: "I love you too, mummy blanket monster."

Jin turned five without knowing much English. Until a month ago, Jin spoke only Korean. For a five-year-old, her Korean was fluent and confident — but English was almost entirely unfamiliar, and written letters in either language were still strange shapes to her. She'd been working through a Korean handwriting workbook at home, but both Korean and English script were just that: unfamiliar fragments of form. Having watched Min and Hyun learn Hangeul, I'd come to believe that early literacy is best built through steady repetition rather than acceleration. There was no rush.

Then school started. In her first week of school, Jin came home visibly tense — she couldn't follow what her teacher was saying, and she was frustrated that she couldn't communicate properly with the friend she'd made in her class. She told me about describing a mermaid in art class entirely through gesture and movement, dancing with her teacher when words failed her — and after that, she started asking more and more often: "How do you say that in English?" English had become something she needed, as a new means of connection.

Many immigrant parents here face the opposite worry. Children born in New Zealand, or those who arrived young, often shift toward English once kindy or school begins — spending more time in English than in their mother tongue, sometimes quietly losing fluency before anyone notices. Saturday Korean schools exist for exactly this reason: to keep the language, the script, and the culture from fading. We are teaching Korean at the same time for the same reason.

Week by week, she began bringing letters home. She'd wander around the house chanting "Mmm, mmm, Milo Monkey" to herself, then hand me a note with mum written on it in careful letters, face glowing with pride. I made picture cards for the letters she was learning, and watched her beam as she announced to the whole family that she'd used them to spell her own name. We practised writing the letters she already knew a little more neatly, worked through craft activity sheets, and listened to alphabet songs together.

We moved on to the third Korean handwriting workbook — she'd already finished two. I help her find the letters she's already learned on each new page, read aloud which consonant and vowel have come together to make each one, and read to her every day from the books she brings me. We find familiar letters in the pages together.

"I love you too, mummy blanket monster." In that one quiet line at the end of the night, I heard how much she had grown. She added too without being taught. She swapped baby for mummy without a second thought. She no longer checks or asks again when I speak to her simply in English — she just understands, and acts. Small things, and yet enormous. This is what it looks like when two languages begin to settle inside one small head.

Good morning, baby blanket monster. Your fun bilingual world is now out there.