Screen shot from @ElBloombito
If you haven’t yet heard of @ElBloombito, you should. The Twitter account was born last weekend as Hurricane Irene hit New York City, the brainchild of a Puerto Rican-Jewish New Yorker whose own Spanish isn’t perfect, but who understands it well enough to have been amused when Mayor Michael Bloomberg addressed residents in butchered Spanish during a news conference.
Rachel Figueroa-Levin, who the New York Times interviewed yesterday, has been tweeting since Saturday in hilariously exaggerated Spanglish as @ElBloombito, which by now has more than 20,000 followers.
@ElBloombito must be experienced to be appreciated. Here are a few highlights as the storm came, passed, and life returned to normal for “Nueva Yorkos.”
Saturday, Aug. 27:
Nueva Yorkos! Remain in la casa para mucho rain y lighningo y thundera! El Bang Bang!
Los kayakers en el harborador es muy estupido. No kayako! Muerto drowno!
Sunday, Aug. 28:
Muchos trees esta falling downo. No stando under los trees. Que splat!
Monday, Aug. 29:
Los trainos y el bussos son muy operationo. Go to worko. No excuso!
And finally, now that life as usual has resumed, one from today:
Buenas Aftertardes! Weather estan muy fantastic! Walkeando tu perro! Pick up el poopador!
As for Bloomberg, who has been good-natured about @ElBloombito, he’s at least trying. And he’s not alone among politicians who insult the Castilian tongue as they do.
Even Los Angeles’ Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, whose command of the language is decent, has been chided for his “pocho” Spanish. A 2005 Los Angeles Times story had him giving up after a stumble and admitting to campaign volunteers, in English, “You know, I was born here, man.”
