It doesn’t matter if you’re bilingual, multilingual, or even polyglot we all have the same habit. There are many for sure, but these are the common ones we like to do.
I’m sure you’ve done this at some point in your life, be it a language learner or not. It’s totally fine and no need to be ashamed.
I’ve been doing this for God knows how long and it's fun.
I tend to talk to myself a lot in these situations:
Have you ever heard someone talking using 2 languages at once? At first, they talk in their native language and somewhere in the middle they change to English or whatever other languages they speak and then switch it again back and forth.
I’m sure you have.
People who speak more than one language like to do this every single time whenever they have the chance. I don’t know yours, but this is pretty common in my country.
I’ve seen people do this quite a lot when they are being interviewed on local TV. I don’t know why they do that, but it annoys me.
Especially when they are asked in their native language and instead of replying in the same language they use English.
If you’ve been learning a few languages you’ll notice there is/ are some proverbs, sayings, idioms, and expressions that just don’t make sense when you translate them to other languages.
When bilingual people are in a situation where they need or want to use those and the right one just doesn’t come up, they end up mixing them.
Appearance can be deceiving. You won’t know one’s ability until you know them.
It’s like the Korean TV show called I Can See Your Voice where the guest singer chooses who among the participants can sing and can’t sing. Usually, they get it right but most of the time, it’s the other way around.
When you’re surrounded by bilingual, multilingual, or polyglots, I guess it’s easy to pretend like you don’t speak the language they speak. Why?
Well, the most common reason is to eavesdrop on them (yeah, some people like to do that). Or carefully listen to whether they can really speak the language fluently and if not, you then smile secretly.
I got ya!
Some, if not most people do this thinking no one will understand. Think again! A few of my friends like to use English, Arabic, Korean and Spanish in their status.
I can barely understand Korean so, I don’t know if they are cursing someone in particular. Just kidding!
I mean there’s no need to use cryptic status if you’re saying something good, right? Or maybe not. Or maybe they just feel like doing so.
There was a time I read my friend’s status and he wrote something sweet in Spanish. ¡Dios mio!
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not a stalker or anything.
It’s just that when I was typing someone’s name on my contact list and somewhere during the process I saw some of the statuses are in foreign languages. I couldn’t help but check it out.
Don’t tell me you’ve never done that.
What’s more exciting than teaching your friends some foreign words if you’re passionate about languages, right? When I told my friend I was learning Spanish, the first thing she asked was what’s ‘I miss you’ in Spanish?
During college, a friend asked me how to greet back the teachers who were conducting the English oral test. I was so happy to share the knowledge I got from another friend of mine and it went on for more than 15 minutes.
If you know me and have been reading my posts, you know I like pronunciation a lot. When I hear my close friends talk in English and their pronunciation isn’t correct, that’s when I chime in.
I’m not trying to show off rather I want to help them improve and I don’t want them to embarrass themselves. It’s as simple as that!
Do you do all of the things mentioned above? Perhaps some of it? Or maybe it’s not on the list? Share it with us below.
©2024 Together We Learn More
©2024 Together We Learn More