4-Year-Old Girl Lights Up When the Grinch Surprises Her by Speaking Fluent Spanish in Viral

A 4-year-old, whose family was visiting Universal Studios Hollywood from Mexico, lit up after hearing the character speak in their native language

Jaqueline Plascencia’s kids meet the Grinch at Universal Studios Hollywood.Credit : Jaqueline Plascencia/Instagram

He might be as cuddly as a cactus, but the Grinch had a pleasant surprise for a young Spanish-speaking visitor, who arrived for a meet and greet at Universal Studios Hollywood.

The iconic Christmas grump, who has become a seasonal favorite at Universal theme parks for his lack of holiday spirit and acerbic banter, initially greeted the little girl in his signature gruff delivery.

“Look at you, you look fantastic,” the Grinch says to 4-year-old Lía, who is dressed in her own Grinch onesie, in a Dec. 7 Instagram reel. “You were waiting all your life for this, weren’t you?”

After not getting a reply right away, she gives him a small but cheerful, “Hola.”

“Oh!” he exclaims, “No hablas Inglés” (“You don’t speak English”). He immediately starts chatting with her in fluent Spanish as she lights up, clearly delighted.

The heartwarming video has gone viral on Instagram, garnering 247,000 likes and more than 200 comments in two days.

While the little girl might not have been waiting her whole life to meet the Grinch, as he implies, she was definitely brimming with excitement ahead of the meet-and-greet, her mom explains in an email interview shared with PEOPLE.

Ana Jaqueline Martínez Plascencia, 32; her husband Josue, 39; and their kids, Eithan, 11, and Lía, recently visited the Universal theme park in California to celebrate Lía’s birthday, which is on Dec. 10.

“They were both super excited, they didn’t take off their costumes for a single minute, even though it was hot,” Plascencia shares in an email translated from Spanish. “We waited in line for more than four hours. We had to eat in line so we wouldn’t lose our place, but the time passed very quickly.”

She adds: “My children got more and more excited as we moved forward.”

A Grinch character performer at Universal Studios Hollywood.Universal Studios Hollywood

The family, visiting from Guadalajara, Mexico, had seen videos online of the Grinch speaking Spanish prior to their trip. In turn, it made the kids even more excited to interact with the character in their own language. Plascencia says her daughter only communicates in Spanish, while her son is currently studying English and speaks and understands it a little.

“My daughter told me the whole way there that when she spoke to him, she would call him ‘Ugly,’ ” Plascencia jokes.

In the video of the interaction, which has amassed more than 1.9 million views on Instagram, the kids tell the Grinch their names, where they are from and if they brought him any onions (his favorite).

“¡Nada! No me traen nada, feos,” the Grinch exclaims, which translates to, “Nothing! They bring me nothing, uglies.”

At the start of their interaction, Plascencia says, she felt bad for the kids who didn’t understand, “but as soon as he spoke [in Spanish], they started smiling,” Plascencia says. “When we finished talking to him, my children repeated every single word he said to us. He called me ugly and my husband bald. They laughed all day and watched the videos many times.”

According to a source familiar with the parks, Universal Studios Hollywood has hired bilingual performers for years to play the Grinch, Cindy Lou Who and other Whos during Grinchmas. Some know Spanish, Japanese and even American Sign Language, though it’s often a surprise for guests as the park does not market these specific meet and greet options.

“It was a wonderful day,” Plascencia adds. “We got home and they’re already planning how to save up to visit him again. They’re already planning what they’re going to say to him the next time they see him. And I’m the happiest mom to be able to share this experience with them.”

And going viral makes the experience all the better: “Every comment I read makes me smile. This empathy with Spanish speakers is incredible,” she says of the people leaving messages from all over the world.