“Try and bring me down, I will rise to the top, say I am wrong, I will prove I'm right; tell me I can't, I'll show you I can!!!”
This quote is what I often say to my heart. The blog you are reading currently is not just my latest one, but it’s the one am writing well nah typing after ages; which brings me back to the quote on the pinnacle of this page. I was to engrossed with my styling job that I forgot my first love “WRITING”; then when some people including my heart said you have changed to tracks to the fashion world & you know more belong here, I felt embarrassed so am “back with bang” now.
The topic I have preferred now is my all time favorite “ENGLISH - COMMUNICATION SKILLS”. Well, most of you guys would wonder what the big deal is there about this communication skill stuff; I want to say you guys one thing; either you people are the lot who have some inbuilt prodigious skill in English (I feel am one among them) or the bunch of kids who speak English with a stylish accent & artificial gestures. I do accept certain people do exist who doesn’t fall in both of these categories yet have an awesome knowledge & command over their language. This blog is just another blog for the above 3 categories, but there are people who really think English as an alien language, if you have not met much people like that then you must have been a student of one of the top C.B.S.E / Anglo – Indian schools & a graduate from top university. Each & every class is an average & above average school/college has at least a gang of guys (by guys I mean the gals too) who are afraid of English like how am afraid of cockroaches. After 4 years of college life in a remote village near Sivakasi, I came to know some shocking facts about how under privileged people in rural Tamil Nadu are. Well I will come up with that part as a separate blog, now about the communication part; let me share you few of my experiences in my college…
- First day in my college started off with those formal self introduction stuff, and believe it or not only two out of sixty plus students spoke in English (obviously am one of that two); and my situation & reaction was similar to that of Tammanna’s in the movie Kalloori (as I dwelled mostly in Chennai & Hyderabad alone plus C.B.S.E education made me think English is a piece of cake for every one).
- Second thing that startled me was 70% of the students in my college were from Tamil medium & the worst was they had never spoke English for even 2-3 continuous minutes.
- Till my school days (although my school is not the crest among the C.B.S.E schools) my teachers made it mandatory to converse only in English in the school premises, habitually I started speaking in English with everyone there. My first big shock came in form of my bossy senior when I said “Excuse me!!” when she stood in my way; at that time nothing happened apart from her mysterious glare, the very same night we had a meeting at hostel they call it Seniors-Juniors Collaboration Meeting (I translated form Tamil to English) & I call it Seniors Bullying Juniors Meeting, in that crap meeting they made me stand in front of 400 students & shouted, scolded, warned me that my attitude was wrong, at that moment I didn’t understand the head or tail of it. After the meeting my roommate explained that it was all because I used the word “Excuse me” to my senior which was a crime of disrespecting her.
- Same scenarios occurred a lot of times, sometimes I laughed outrageously at their hesitation & hatred towards English & at times I laughed prudently.
- Lots more of funny, sentimental scenes happened which I will explain in my next blog.
- The last & worst shock was when I read my slam book, not even a single soul (I mean the ones who studied in Tamil medium) wrote correctly. I never expected them to write poems or beautiful jargons, but I thought 4 years of Engineering Education with 6 communication skills paper would have made them learn at least some basics but I was in vain.
o Some of the words from my slam book:
§ tallent – talent
§ gorgious – gorgeous
§ bouldly – boldly
§ you work hardly – you work hard / you are a hard worker
§ notty – naughty
§ prosperious – prosperous
§ you English speak nice – You speak English nicely / et al
Well, I really do appreciate some of my friends who always approached me or some other student who converses properly in English for help, sorry guys I couldn’t help you much because most of you approached me only while I was waiting for my H.R interview with H.C.L; the things you needed from me, here it goes:
- First & foremost love English like you love your mother tongue, I have seen most of you guys defend very well in the so called group discussions on movies, cities etc., in Tamil/Telugu.
- If it’s your first time with an English daily opt for Deccan Chronicle, slowly you can switch over to “The Hindu”, because if you start with The Hindu then you will feel that English is vague which is actually not so.
- Try to converse small terms & sentences correctly with no grammatical error.
- Always go in for a pronunciation tutorial from BEC.
- Keep an Oxford dictionary (at least a pocket one) handy.
- Try watching Hollywood movies with sub titles (most of my friends at college especially guys watch it just for the visual effects & other quixotic effects).
- Read novels not the 1000 – 2000 pages which you have seen in my room, go for simple stuffs, for beginners in reading (you are good in English or not, it doesn’t matter) opt for books like Enid Blyton’s Famous Five / Secret Seven, Hardy Boys, even Chetan Bhagat’s because his books are matured yet realistic & adaptable to Indian youths.
- What’s more that’s it… English is as simple as that & if you want to master it you must have these skills
§ E – Elegance
§ N – Naturalness
§ G – Grammar
§ L – Love (for the language)
§ I – Ignition (to speak)
§ S – Style
§ H – Hell – bent (on speaking)
Well I will wind up my saying my last but never the least opinion “Since English is the global language, if you master it; then yours is Earth & everything in it” (literally):P
Catch U Guys Up In The Next Blog With A More Interesting Topic
Until Then,
Love You,
Take Care,
Cheers,
Tanya
