Parlez vous Mats (part deux)?

We all know what a challenge it can be to learn a foreign language. Mats-speak is no different. After a week of insistently repeating "RAF" we finally realized it might be more than a random babble. Then the work begins.

1. Are we understanding all the sounds correctly? Considering Mats can't seem to pronmounce the "S" at the beginning of a work (at the end is no problem - go figure) and his habit of condensing &/or shortening words to a single sylable, this can be deceivingly difficult.

2. Is he speaking English, Dutch, or Mats-speak? Mats-speak would include such fondly repeated words that we haven't yet figured out if there is a meaning assigned, such as "peechoo", "meena", and "teetum", as well as some that, although they do not resemble either the English or Dutch words for an object have a clear meaning, such as "wyat" (=airplane).

I think the state department should considering using Mats-speak as a secret code.

"Raf" turned out to be "Giraffe", by the way. Who knew that the long-legged creature figured so prominently in his life.