Learning from the Radio

In Des Moines, we were pedestrians, especially in the summer. In Mérida, we drive. A lot. Every day. We listen to the same radio station on our trips through the colas, the traffic jams that double our driving time. "Paaaaaatience, much paaaatience, with the traffic jams," the DJ urges us. The emisora that accompanies us is 97.5: Tourism Radio. How perfect!

Run by the government, the programming includes regular, fairly long live broadcasts of Chávez speeches, and the news reports are pro-government. I hear the perspective that is so reviled by many of my university colleagues. I pay attention to how the state frames the news, and I even got to hear Chávez utter his hot new insult, pitiyanqui, from his own lips.

The play format has 100.3 ‘The Bus” (a Des Moines ipod-shuffle radio station) beat by a mile. Want to hear a gaita song, the traditional music from Maracaibo, Venezuela? Check! How about “I kissed a girl?” Presente! What about some 80s Venezuelan pop (the music of my youthful sojourn here)? You got it! And what if I’m in the mood for The Cars? Or salsa? Or “Endless Love”? Check, check, check. It’s called adult contemporary, and when we are willing to sit through the chattiest DJs ever, we reap a station playing range of musical styles, almost all of which fit my tastes. Except maybe the Lionel Riche/Diana Ross duet -- but Risa loved it.

Until yesterday, the ads on noventa y siete punto cinco (97.5) annoyed me to the point of changing the station. To my ears, they are overly repetitive and hyperbolic. Little did I realize, they serve as my secret Spanish teachers. In the past day, Anson and Risa have begun calling out the words and phrases they recognize from the ads as they listen. This morning, they sang along with the merengue-style furniture store ad. They chant the call numbers in time with the announcer. Little sponge-brains are amazing! And, their noticing the sounds and places of Mérida brings Latin America to me with a whole new set of eyes.