Day 52: What you don't know about...

Foreign

Hello, Readers! I know it has been a while since I last wrote. It’s been almost three months. Please tell me all about your summer, I promise you probably have had a more exciting summer than I have. See, I’m taking classes for the whole summer, which will result in me taking classes for two years in a row with no significant break. It’s boring, and sometimes stressful, and I don’t have crazy landscaping trip to Brazil, no safari to Zambia, no coffee tasting in France or no cruising in Japan. But I can’t complain. I chose this, I chose to pursue my dream as soon as possible and I can enjoy myself once I get there.

Anyways, this is going off topic. I’m taking cognitive psychology this semester, and we were learning about language the other day. It’s funny, because I think I’m starting to drift away from my native language. I think exclusively in English now, and I can describe concepts more easily in English than in my mother’s tongue. I think it’s bad, and it’s a problem. I want to be bilingual, equally fluent in both languages, and now I have to work on my Vietnamese again. It does come full cycle, because it wasn’t always that way.

I first started to learn English when I was in the first grade. Pretty early huh? You’d think I’ll be fluent in a few years, but no. I was better than other kids my age, but speaking English full time? No way. Well, then I was dropped into an international school for a year, and I was pretty confident. I socialized and talked to the teachers and understood things they said, so when I made that faithful decision to come stateside, I was questioning myself “How hard could it really be?”

Well, the answer to that question, right now, after almost six years since I landed at LAX, is.

Pretty.

Fucking.

Hard.

I empathize with all my fellow international kids, that for some reasons, decided to take a risk to the unknown. I know what you’ve been through, my friends. I know the struggles you have overcome, or overcoming. I understand you, from my Chinese friends who formed a clique of their own to the Pakistani that was all alone by himself. I know you, and I admire you, and I am proud of you.

For the native speakers, I want you to know what it’s like, being me or any foreigners you encounter from here on out.

I want you to know what you don’t know.

I bet most of you have taken lessons in Spanish or Latin or French or some other languages. Some of you hated it. You couldn’t tell what form of the word “jugar” to use or why you use “tengo” to describe when you’re hungry. Now, we had to learn that. I had to learn that. I had to know why it was play-played-played but also eat-ate-eaten. Not only that, I had to listen to you, because not listening wasn’t exactly a choice. In my language class, the teachers said things slowly. But in real life, when you all are gossiping about movies and things, those words aren’t slow. I had to catch up with that. I had to understand that. I had to get the slangs that you used, all the references that you took for granted. In no way would I imagine having a crush means having feelings for someone, because in my mind, “crush” is a verb when you press something to pieces. It took time and a lot of effort to get there.

Oh, yeah, but I didn’t come here to socialize. I came here to further my education. That means, I have to actually learn math, science, philosophy, history, art and religion (!?). I know everyone has a subject that they don’t like. Some hate math (a lot actually, and I don’t know why), some couldn’t stand any science, and some can’t get anything in history right. I know, it’s fair. Some subjects are hard. I can’t blame you.

Stop.

Now, imagine you have to learn your least favorite subject in Spanish. Imagine you’d have to understand the derivatives of a function in Latin. Imagine you’d have to understand the mechanism of cellular respiration in Mandarin. Imagine you’d have to learn about World War II and how Hitler shouldn’t invade Russia during winter, but in French or Italian. Can’t imagine it? Cringing already? Tears coming out of your eyes?

Welcome to our world.

It’s the world where you have to write essays about how the Great Gasby’s fatal flaw is, when you can’t even understand what the whole book is about. You have to describe oxidative phosphorylation when you can barely know how to spell “mitochondria”.

I don’t blame you. I don’t even want to brag. The fact of the matter is, we chose this. We chose our path. We chose to risk our certainty for something uncertain. That’s on us. That’s our job.

What I’m asking though, is that you can see these struggles and somewhat sympathize with us. Sometimes we won’t understand what you’re saying. That doesn’t mean that we’re losers and not as capable. Sometimes we will say the wrong things, that doesn’t mean that we’re weird and creepy. It is just so hard to understand and adapt with the language and the occasion, so I wished that my cultural transition had been smoother.

So please, that’s where you can help.

Don’t leave us out.

We can learn so much from you, if you only give us a chance.

So please.

Give us a chance.

                                                                                                                        Always,

                                                                                                                        Denny

P.S: Thank you, Alena and Taylor, for taking that chance on me.