Stupid Questions (Yet Again)
I’ve been on TCKid for a few months now, but this is the first time I’ve had the motivation to actually make my own post. This probably won’t happen again for another 3 months, haha.
Ok, so I know a lot of people can probably relate to this question and find it realllllllllly annoying, but I’ve had so many people throughout the course of my life tell me that I’m good at English, and I’m like…obviously. Anyway, one person said to me “wow, you sound like a native English speaker” (after I had told her I’m from Ghana) which seemed particularly stupid coming from her, as she’s Filipina, and should be used to people making stupid comments like that to her. (A lot of people don’t seem to be aware that they use English in the Philippines, for some reason.) Anyway, I thought “are you serious? I just told you that I’m from Ghana” but I said “English is the official language of Ghana.” I mean, I know I sound American, but she didn’t say “You sound American”, she said “You sound like a native speaker of English.”
Also, my boss asked me “How good was your English when you moved to America?” and I said “I am a native speaker of English…” I don’t know how he didn’t know the answer to that when I had told him on like 2823098234089 occasions that my parents spoke to me in Japanese and English, and that I had gone to an American school. It was like he hadn’t listened to a word I had said or something. Then he said “But what was your accent like?” WTF? What does my accent have to do with my ability to speak English? So is the implication supposed to be that people with Ghanaian (and probably African as a whole) accents can’t speak proper English? Because I find that incredibly offensive at best.
Anyone else with annoying encounters of “Wow, you speak good English!”, especially from people who should be the last ones saying that to you?
I was born in Accra, Ghana; where both my parents are from. I moved to Tokyo, Japan, at the age of 1. At the age of 12, I moved to hell on earth, known to some people as Albany, New York. I went to Michigan State in East Lansing, Michigan at the age of 18. At 22, I returned to Albany, NY where I stayed there for one excruciatingly soul-crushing year. After that, I came to to Shanghai China, where I've been for a few months. If I had gone to the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, I would most definitely have been in Gryffindor.
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8 Comments to “Stupid Questions (Yet Again)”
June 21st, 2008 at 4:40 am
This is a really good first post! Welcome to TCKid! (even though you’ve been here for 3 months ha ha!)
I get the opposite reaction. Since I grew up in the US, and I tell people that I’m “from” Finland, they don’t believe me. The conversation goes like this after I tell them I’m from Finland:
Person: “Really? That’s so cool!”
Me: “Yeah..” *nervous laughter*
Person: “So can you speak…uhh…what do they speak there?”
Me: “Finnish, and yes, I can speak it fluently.”
Person: “OOH! Say something in Finnish” *I freaking HATE this part!!*
Me: *sigh* “What do you want me to say?”
Person: “Oh I don’t know, anything!”
Me:….
or a few times I’ve gotten
Person: “But you sound American..”
Me: “I moved to the States when I was two years old, so I don’t have an accent in English, but I have an American accent in Finnish..”
Person: “Oh..”
It’s just an awkward situation all around, I feel you!
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June 21st, 2008 at 11:37 am
” Me: “Finnish, and yes, I can speak it fluently.”
Person: “OOH! Say something in Finnish” *I freaking HATE this part!!*
Me: *sigh* “What do you want me to say?”
Person: “Oh I don’t know, anything!”
Me:…. ”
Haha I hate that too….but very true and happens to me all the tim! Reading your post made me laugh.
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June 21st, 2008 at 2:08 pm
Oh God, when I get that question, I feel like a performing seal…like it would really amuse them if I would only sit up, clap my flippers and bark for the “fish” of their approval.
Worse yet, when I say I’m from Denmark, I get: “Say something in Dutch.” (At which point I want to swear at them in Urdu - no chance they’ll understand, but it’s really colorful and sounds harsh!) I give them my pat answer, “The Danes and the Dutch both have blondes and windmills and wooden shoes, but they’re the ones with the tulips. In Denmark we speak Danish.”
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June 22nd, 2008 at 2:54 am
Yeah, I hate it when others start asking me to speak in a native language. Sucks more for me because I can’t actually speak mandarin/cantonese and my malay is at it’s absolute basic! Still, after all the requests, I’ve finally learnt how to say ‘hello’ at least, and ‘my name is____’.
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June 23rd, 2008 at 4:50 am
Haha, I’ve been on here for like 7 months now. But yeah, that’s another thing. Or people will be like “Do you speak Japanese?” After I say I lived there for 11 years. I’m like “No, I just walked around for 11 years….didn’t know shit!”
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June 23rd, 2008 at 11:07 am
Heh, I often have the opposite of Annette. I’m Dutch and I get asked all the time to speak/translate Danish. So I tell them, no, it’s not Danish, but Dutch.
Oooh, Deutsch!! You’re German!
Er, no, you know, Holland?
Aaahhh, Poland!!
I usually give up by then and just smile and nod and have another glass of wine.
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June 23rd, 2008 at 4:08 pm
Hooo! That actually makes me feel better, Areke. I had no idea the Dutch got mixed up with the Danes from the other direction. I DID have my suspicions about the Dutch/Deutsch connection, especially since we have the “Pennsylvania Dutch” in America, who are, of course, German.
I have enjoyed various people enlightening me as to the whereabouts of Denmark:
1)That’s the capital of Sweden, isn’t it?
2)Northern Europe - where’s that exactly?
3)Isn’t that a part of Germany? (Uh no, we’ve fought very hard not to be for many centuries!!! ;p)
Or all they know is Hans Christian Andersen fairy tales, and so they think we’re must be “cute.” It’s a function of translation - the French regard Andersen more like Poe as Danish translates far better into French than into English.
Any other famous writers lose something in translation?
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June 23rd, 2008 at 11:24 pm
haha I can totally relate. Once I got introduced to a group of people by a friend… Who immediatly told them that I spoke four languages… Which for some reason made them think that I could be used as an entertainment source (they proceeded in shoving a phone in my hand and asked me to call random people they knew in different languages).
… this was in the states…
funny thing though is that ive been also considered as knowing few languages in a community where 5 was the standard minimum.
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