I got an epiphany today and I just won't let it die again when I know how far it can take me. Enough running. Life is quick, ugly, and unfair when you wear my own spectacles. False impulse and phony achievements can no longer work as replacements.
I'm saving the girl who feels she doesn't belong because the truth is that the world is far too dull for someone as colourful as she is. And there are people out there who will need her strength. She doesn't fit because she's not supposed to. It has been so long now that the world has manipulated people on how they see things. Which is beautiful? Which is not? Which is right and which is wrong? This has affected them more than they realize it could.
I find it ironic that in most crucial things, most people settle for what is safe -- the middle ground. Prejudice is set aside and age-old concepts are compromised. People tend to go for what's easy and readily available to them. Snap, snap. Just like that.
Little girl, stop playin safe. Hang up those ugly hings for display and see them for what they are and not what the world tells them to be. Choose. Take a stand. Pick a side. Buy something for heaven's sake and don't just stand with your back against the wall. Delve deeper. Break the surface. Create tension.
There will come a time when the safe will drown in his own head filled with mere ideas of things he will never have. Safe One, die not knowing an epiphany -- no matter how tiny -- has already hit you right between the eyes.
Thursday, May 8, 2008
Friday, May 2, 2008
Mind your English
"I am sick, you work me! If I die, who will eat my family?! You?!"
For sure you are familiar with this old joke that started out funny and has become silly these days, and you must have known how it's supposed to be translated in Filipino. After Melanie Marquez's infamous long-legged answer aired simultaneously all over the world, the next big thing the Filipinos had made fun of for a few weeks was Ms. World delegate Jenina San Miguel in this year's Bb. Pilipinas. After a good laugh, we started introspecting whether our quality of English has degraded so seriously that Ms. Jenina has become the epitome of many of us who are not able to express well in this language. Or they're was... they was the one who just can't speak English well at all. DOT. I mean, period.
As the third English-speaking nation in the world, our country is undoubtedly facing this serious problem, since we use English as our second language. When I was still back in the Philippines, I would take pride in this fact and would make a good laugh or two at those non-English speakers or those millions of people from around the world who use English as a foreign language. Having been out of the country and conversing with non-Filipinos in English has strongly changed my seemingly invincible point of view. True, they're not as good and fluent as I am, but thinking of the fact that English is as foreign to them as much as other languages such as French, German, Chinese, etc. are foreign to us Filipinos, I have come to admire their capacity to speak quite well in that language. It's just the need to speak that has opted them to learn English.
Lately, I have bumped into an Arabic-speaking Egyptian colleague and befriended him much more than I thought I would befriend a non-Filipino. It never crossed my mind that I could ever relate to a non-Filipino before. But this time I can relate to him better than I can relate to most of my Filipino colleagues. True, our cultures and beliefs disagree most of the time but there's one thing or two that bridge the gap - English and the non-verbal language, both of which are universal. I have realized two things from him: communicating using a universal language is the lifeblood of a relationship; and non-English speakers tend to learn more than one foreign language. My Egyptian friend speaks French and German aside from English and his local tongue Arabic. I asked him one time if it's difficult to learn a foreign language and I admired his answers: first, it depends on your necessity of learning the language; second, it depends on your interest with the one teaching you. His first statement reminded me of my French class back in College because I only learned the language much more for the sake of my grade (honestly) than for my desire to use it, although I'd come to love it later.
Then it hit me, perhaps these non-Filipinos who have to learn English feel the same way as I did when I was learning French - insecurity in speaking the language for the first time. Eventually I had come to appreciate its unique intricacy although I knew it would take me years to perfect it. I was just sorry I didn't start as early as I started learning English. As for non-English speakers who have learned to speak English because they have to, they have made a lot of difference. For us Filipinos, let's keep up our being the third English speakers and avoid being the mockery of other countries. Because being made fun of due to language deficiency is never funny at all.
For sure you are familiar with this old joke that started out funny and has become silly these days, and you must have known how it's supposed to be translated in Filipino. After Melanie Marquez's infamous long-legged answer aired simultaneously all over the world, the next big thing the Filipinos had made fun of for a few weeks was Ms. World delegate Jenina San Miguel in this year's Bb. Pilipinas. After a good laugh, we started introspecting whether our quality of English has degraded so seriously that Ms. Jenina has become the epitome of many of us who are not able to express well in this language. Or they're was... they was the one who just can't speak English well at all. DOT. I mean, period.
As the third English-speaking nation in the world, our country is undoubtedly facing this serious problem, since we use English as our second language. When I was still back in the Philippines, I would take pride in this fact and would make a good laugh or two at those non-English speakers or those millions of people from around the world who use English as a foreign language. Having been out of the country and conversing with non-Filipinos in English has strongly changed my seemingly invincible point of view. True, they're not as good and fluent as I am, but thinking of the fact that English is as foreign to them as much as other languages such as French, German, Chinese, etc. are foreign to us Filipinos, I have come to admire their capacity to speak quite well in that language. It's just the need to speak that has opted them to learn English.
Lately, I have bumped into an Arabic-speaking Egyptian colleague and befriended him much more than I thought I would befriend a non-Filipino. It never crossed my mind that I could ever relate to a non-Filipino before. But this time I can relate to him better than I can relate to most of my Filipino colleagues. True, our cultures and beliefs disagree most of the time but there's one thing or two that bridge the gap - English and the non-verbal language, both of which are universal. I have realized two things from him: communicating using a universal language is the lifeblood of a relationship; and non-English speakers tend to learn more than one foreign language. My Egyptian friend speaks French and German aside from English and his local tongue Arabic. I asked him one time if it's difficult to learn a foreign language and I admired his answers: first, it depends on your necessity of learning the language; second, it depends on your interest with the one teaching you. His first statement reminded me of my French class back in College because I only learned the language much more for the sake of my grade (honestly) than for my desire to use it, although I'd come to love it later.
Then it hit me, perhaps these non-Filipinos who have to learn English feel the same way as I did when I was learning French - insecurity in speaking the language for the first time. Eventually I had come to appreciate its unique intricacy although I knew it would take me years to perfect it. I was just sorry I didn't start as early as I started learning English. As for non-English speakers who have learned to speak English because they have to, they have made a lot of difference. For us Filipinos, let's keep up our being the third English speakers and avoid being the mockery of other countries. Because being made fun of due to language deficiency is never funny at all.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
