728: Lights, Camera, Christmas!
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- Okay everybody, ready? Ready? Light? Camera? Christmas. - Uh, well, my parents say that, uh, I can't have a dog. - This is Parequa, age 11. - So, I wanted like another animal that is like fuzzy and it like walks around. - You know, I'm not really a pet sort of person. I think she knew she couldn't get a dog. Basically. - This is Linda, her mom. Linda's a reporter at WBEZ. The bubble gradio station, that's her home. - So, guinea pig was, I think, something she felt she could actually ask for. - You know, this is second place, I guess. It's still fuzzy walks around. - When this husband is Mexican, and the kids lived in Mexico when they were smaller, so they don't write to Santa to ask for what they want. The Mexican tradition at Christmas is to write to the Three Kings. - So, she wrote this letter to the Three Kings, and do you want me to read it? - Yeah, yeah, yeah, could you read it? - All right, it says, "Cadido jayas majos, es pero que estan muy bien." She says, like, "Dear Three Kings, I hope you're doing very well. I hope you're well." - I thought that was a nice touch. - That is a nice touch. - Yeah. - Esta año esta penseando perirón con ajillo de india. She says, "This year, I was thinking of asking for a guinea pig." And then she writes, she has, like, an arrow. She's like, it's like an afterthought. She wrote, "A real one, de verdad." Then she goes on and asks for some other things. But what she really wanted, I mean, she has this whole list of things, but honestly, I don't ever remember her talking about anything else except the guinea pig. [music] - So, comes a big morning. This was two years ago. Pareco was just nine. The Three Kings did, in fact, bring her guinea pig, and, of course, she was thrilled. She named it Luna. - The guinea pig was, like, in her arms, and it was running around her bed, and she was just, like, in love. - Well, that lasted about an hour before, you know, I just noticed she was scratching her forearms a lot. - And she said that they were, like, hives. I was, like, allergic to my guinea pig. - She was completely scared that I would give the guinea pig away immediately. And I think her one goal was to, like, keep the guinea pig. So she definitely did not complain about the hives. - They were big red blotches, the size of silver dollars. Pareco, however, would not be deterred. - Like, she still held it. She tried for a while. I was, like, maybe if you cover yourself up. So, you know, what she started doing was she would put on this full face mask that she usually used, like, on the coldest days in Chicago. - It was black. All you could see were her eyes. Linda showed me a photo of the full get-up. You can see it on our website. - She basically looks like a sabbatista rebel. She's got a long-sleeved shirt. She's got her winter gloves on. And in the winter gloves is, like, the little guinea pig peeking out from her hands. - I mean, while paper towels stick out several inches from the gloves. - So that there's absolutely no gap between her long-sleeved shirt and the gloves. - She looks like a young terrorist. - With a cute guinea pig.
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