When Ariana Giampietro brought the rescue dog named Monty home, she couldn’t understand why the adorable pup was ignoring her commands. Perplexed, she got in touch with the shelter and was told Monty only understands Spanish.
Giampietro, 26, from Gainesville, Florida, works as an adoption case manager for children in care. She had been caring for the mixed-breed American pit bull terrier for just a week and “was really confused why he wasn’t responding to commands.
“I could tell he wanted to—he was listening to me, but it was like he didn’t know how,” Giampietro said, according to Newsflare.
In a Newsflare video, Giampietro can be heard expressing her amazement at the discovery.
“Oh my God!” she says, “You are Spanish!”
“Up!” Ariana then commands, but to no avail—the pup stays where he is, looking at her blankly. It’s only when she loudly says “arriba!” that Monty instantly springs to his feet.
As soon as Giampietro found out Monty had previously lived on a farm with a Spanish family, she instantly understood what the issue was with her cute little puppy.
“I was amazed. I was so happy to understand where the dissonance came from,” she said in a statement to Newflare.
Other than not sitting and obeying other simple English commands when asked, Monty was well-behaved; he just hadn’t a clue what she was saying to him. Immediately, Giampietro looked up a few Spanish words and when she spoke them aloud, was shocked and delighted to see the clever boy responding.
“After I started speaking to him in Spanish, it was like he settled right in,” she said. "He started getting ‘zoomies,’ and his overall confidence skyrocketed because all of a sudden we weren’t alien to him.
“Nothing prepares you for the shock of being able to bridge that cultural divide—I was shocked but so excited when it all made sense.”
By happy coincidence, Giampietro’s partner Andrew Gomez, 27, speaks fluent Spanish and works for the local law enforcement.
“It’s weird. I had been telling my boyfriend for so long that I wanted to learn Spanish, and I downloaded Duolingo but never used it,” she said. ”Andrew now laughs about it because having a Spanish-speaking boyfriend never made me commit to Duolingo—but having a Spanish-speaking dog has.”
The couple are now committed to teaching Monty commands in English, too—so he can be bilingual and understand both before settling into his forever home with an English-speaking family.
In the meantime, Monty is enjoying life with his foster mom. Giampietro has another pit bull named Lucy, and aided by his new-found confidence, Monty now enjoys romping with her.
Sadly, Giampietro lost her beloved Jack, another pit bull, to cancer in November last year. That was when she decided to start fostering dogs—pit bulls in particular. Just after Christmas, she brought Monty home and dedicated herself to looking after him.
“Before having Jack,” she said, “I never realized how compassionate pit bulls are, they’re so loving and loyal.
“I wanted to make it my life mission to raise awareness of that because there is the stigma that they’re all violent and can’t be trained—which is not true.
“They are so responsible and loyal and we need more loving people to be taking in these magnificent dogs.”
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