Oct 10, 2009

I'm a bit embarassed

and there's the reason. the reason is right there in the title.
How do you spell embarassed? is it with two s or two r? is it ember... or embar...?

I feel bad. I'm also a bit mad at myself.
I don't speak English that well, I don't speak German that well and I for sure don't speak French and Spanish that well, despite the fact that I have classes in school for all languages.

See, it's not that I don't speak very well. My teachers always compliment my pronounciation in German or Spanish or French. But it's the lack of words.
I've left the states when I was 12. I've been living in Germany before, for half a year, when I was 6 or 7.
So it is kind of not my fault. What 12 year old knows words that a 16 yeard old should know?
I sometimes fail to have a decent conversation with my friends from the states or NZ or the UK or Australia... well the people in Australia are hard to understand in general. Like they call their friends "mights" and mean mates. Whatever.

What I mean is, I feel a bit stupid not knowing certain words. I also feel stupid because I know them in German but not in English. Sometimes it's the other way around. I want to say something and I know the English word but can't use it and so I have to walk my way around it and use descriptive language to make myself understood. For me it's degrading because that's what little children do.

I feel inferior when I know that I have no reason at all to feel that way. I'm an intelligent enough guy and although I haven't read a lot of books, I do know a lot of characters of literature, writers and stories. I'm also very interested in politics and know a lot about the world and geography.
But it's... I don't know... it bothers me.

My friend Lucas wrote something to me two days ago. He wrote something like "please, try to speak English". And I know he didn't mean to hurt me and it actually didn't hurt me at all at that moment, but in hindsight I know exactly what he meant. It's bad when you can't make yourself clear.

Sometimes when I'm skyping to my friend Jake, I have to speak slowly to buy time... time to think hard about the right word I wanna use to say what I wanna say. And it's bad when you are trying to have a deep conversation and don't want to only scratch the surface and talk about superficial stuff and call everything "that's hot" like Paris Hilton.

aaaaaaaah, I'm frustrated.

PS: ignore any typos, it's fucking 6:30 on a Saturday morning. I have every right to misspell things at this time of the day.

3 comments:

Jakearam said...

You never have, and never will, EVER sound superficial or like Paris Hilton to me. I find you insightful and intelligent, and I love you.

Nic said...

I love you too, Jacob Christopher >HUG<

Nahanni said...

The joys of second-language learning... and third, and fourth....