Catinga is one of my favorite words. Most of the Guarani I learned from Ben is bad — swear words — only I didn’t know that at the time. I just knew he would say the same phrase when something went wrong. Once, when we were visiting his mother, I said that phrase, and she was scandalized. That’s when I learned that it was “colorful” language!

My other favorite word I learned from Ben is Spanish — chispeando. It means a really light rain — one that is more than a mist but less than a sprinkle. We don’t have any equivalent in English that I know of. Actually, chispeando means “sparkling” and it morphed into a description of rain. I think that is very appropriate for that in-between rain because it really does sparkle, doesn’t it?