Because loss is gain?
I hear people speaking all around me a different language on a daily basis. Seldom do I hear English. If I do hear English it is usually broken English. Even the most liberal of English teacher would cringe to hear some of the English I’ve heard.
(However I have run into to some students who speak English wonderfully. One is named Betty. She’s going places.)
This has been a tough experience being in a place where my first language is everyone’s second or third language at most. Often it is non-existent from their vocabulary. I’ve had to adjust what I say, whether it be in Chinese or whether it is in English. If it’s in Chinese I have to hope that not only can they understand me, but I can understand them. Communication is a two way game. If I speak English I must make sure I speak in a way a low level English speaker can understand, which often has me speaking in a Chinese form of English. Sometimes I’m speaking both to the same person.
However I’m noticing that I often forget words or forget how to speak clearly.
If I’ve grammatically been wrong throughout my posts this summer part of the reason is not proofreading enough and also losing my grasp of the English language. You don’t realize that if you don’t use something how you can lose it. It is like riding a bike, but it seems like every day is learning how to ride a bike again.
Sometimes I search for a word and have to sit in front of my computer typing the definition to try and find the word that I’m thinking of by its definition. It’s getting bad. I’ll be glad to be able to speak English again instead of my broken English I’ve slowly acquired over the past summer.
It’s even worse when you’re trying to write a research paper for your online class. I’m sure my professor just thinks I’m either crazy or not trying.
Hopefully the first.
-NL
Ps. The “Losting” in Losting Language is a joke. It’s not that bad, but I did type it that way at first on accident.
