Language

I just had a small dialogue (debate) on whether or not I have to learn new language with a person that hates English, and had a hard time learning my language (citing age as the debacle in learning new language (I just think the person is lazy and busy, that's why)). So this leave me to be the sole learner of that person’s local language in order to speak better with the person.

I speak Indonesian, Javanese, Osing (local language in Banyuwangi, East Java), English, and a little French. I studied Dutch due to habit with my Grandmother although nowadays I completely forgot about it (French kind of push it off my mind. It is very easy, I guess, for Indonesian to learn new language if they are intend to. Because all of the children here has two language when they were born, traditional language provided by the area they are living in, and national language Bahasa Indonesia. At home, parents will talk to the children in traditional language, while Indonesian is being teach at school, newspapers, tv, radio, songs, etc.

In my case, English, sedikit Bahasa Indonesia, and Javanese were my first language. English was being taught first, then Javanese. My mother herself was not really a good English speaker, because when she learned about English she was 28/29 years old. My father speaks Javanese and Indonesian more at home. I spoke English until I turned four or five before my Father intervened and started talking more Javanese with me.

My traditional language kept being altered when I was a child due to moving in to a new place every couple of months or one year.

I read this post on Quora and I agree that if you want your child to speak more than one language, you have to bear the pain of learning new languages or speak with mixed language. In my case, my mother mixed English and Indonesian (we changed Indonesian to Melayu when we lived in Borneo) so I didn’t forget Indonesian (I had a difficulty to speak in Indonesian until I was 8).

Also a great advantage of keep learning/listening to new language, you will adapt to a new dialect very quickly. I started to realize that I can adapt to a new dialect very easy when I lived my teenage life in Banyuwangi for a year. I didn’t even understand Osing language at first, but after two weeks listening to people speaking, I got to speak Indonesian with the same dialect, made me sounds nothing like I am new to the city. I learned Osing around two months of actively listening and speaking to classmates, and voila! By the time I hit three months of living in the city, I speak Osing and understand it alright, although not as good as my other friends.

So, Turkish. Do I really have to study you? Will you give me your delight by the time I finished understanding you?

#personal #language