Dilemma of English

By ISHU DHAKRAS

I some what agree with that piece of article and also with janaandolan. I love  and respect languages whichever I prefer to speak .  We have such a mindset that if we speak English then we automatically  start to think Oh this person is good.

 English boldai ma mahan ani Nepali boldai ma pakhe hune ani arko tira English boldai ma afno  bhasha  lai hela gareko ra English janya chu bhanera dhak diyeko ho bhani sochne hamro manasikata  nabadliye samma yesto ghatna ghati nai rahancha.

to me "posee" or "showoff" are those who answer questions in a conversation in english when you have asked the question to him/her in nepali.  acting like he understands and listens in nepali and then has to answer in english. And also those who answer you back in nepali and follow it again in english... those are the few arrogant that i would like to avoid...

"When U go to Rome, Do as the Rome does." Chapter closed dude.

Use pure nepali- do not mix any english words if you really wanna b good, thats what foreigners do who can speak nepali.

Now talking about those half-nepali and half-americakn or somebody of nowhere, they are like that. The thing is that " They forgot their background, thats it." I mean they think they achieved something that nobody has achieved.  So no headache.

Rest of all who do like that are "अनपढ" . This is my opinion.

Sabaiko ko satru - i disagree with ur opinion. "When U go to Rome, Do as the Rome does." Chapter closed dude. -

It applies to people who aren't from rome and are coming to rome for some reason. what about the people that are from rome. To those people who were taught since kid on what special english words to use in nepali conversation. There are many words that dont have substitute in nepali, what u gonna do, invent a word in nepali? Only very few percentage of people in nepal actually speak true nepali languaguage. I dont think we were taught to always say kameez for shirt. I am sure many of us always said shirt and there is absolutely nothing wrong with it. and being good is not always about using all nepali words during your conversation, if you have to use some english words in between that helps ease conveying your information then use it.  

Bottomline:

The British influence during the past century has given complex to all former colonies or proxy-colonies indigeneous people. They have etched in our minds that somehow anything english is superior. We subconsciously have accepted their superiorty but consciously resent that fact. Hence the conflict due to the complexes.

"English matrai talk garda ta better nai hunchha ni. But some people  lai chai Nepali language mix garnai parney! Hamro dyaddy le pani ta back bone hurt gare pachhi English speaking chhodnu bhako. Drinking kwit garnu bhanda bhanda finally kwit garnu bhako, body shake garera fall down garnu bhayechha! Tyaha dekhi ta hospitalize ni"

And then there is "This taxi is so packed yaaar, better to go by hidera!" And then there is  "This sabzi is so piro yaar! Watar pass gara ta!"

And so on and so forth, it goes on and on, until I realize that a fly has run amok in my wide open mouth!

Nepali ma bhanney ho bhaney: Dhentereng!!!

www.sajha.com = ववव.साझा.कअम  

Here are a couple of my personal experiences (speaking Nepali to a Nepali):

Incident 1 in Nepal - in Investment Bank in DurbarMarg in Dec07:

Incident 1 -me: Namaskar bahini. Euta kalam ekchhin maageko. Saano dharso kornu paryo re yesko (showing the check) naam ko terso garera.....

The girl gives me uncomfortable look. Passes a pen, without looking at me or the pen. 

Incident 2  not in Nepal - a Nepali guy in a sales company calls me, starts chatting with me in Nepali before I get to speak a complete word except the Hello.

he - Dai, ma SuperTelecom bata ki, mero naam ravi, ani aaja haamro euta promotion chha ki, tyasaile tapailai phone gareko...

me - eh... ani kun contract / phone ni?

he - dai, euta kura sodhu hai.. Tapai pani Nepali ho?

me - speechless.

he - goes on to ask about where I am from , what I do, how long I have been here... blah, blah blah. (the bolded questions are more common IME)

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My questions:

In incident 1, did I break the comfort level of the Investment Bank girl? Inversely, has Enlish language taken over as the 'language of preference' or has it become a class indicator?

Incident 2, why are Nepalis (pardon my generalization) hell bent on asking 'aray, tapai pani Nepali?' whenever someone replies back to them in tharra Nepali to a question they asked in Nepali? (This question will lead me to start another tread....). Also, why do the Nepali people (pardon my generalization, again), need to know more than they need to know about another Nepali.

Thoughts, opinions, experiences, counters welcome.

_x

And all the Mexicans think I am a "posse"....just a heads up: posse = entourage!...That would be posey? So, yeah! all the Mexicans think that I am a posey!

The matter at hand is as narrow as broader as it might seem. I grew up attending English school, and barely making it after Good morning and How are you and What is your name, it finally came to me: Speaking English is a necessity, rather than a choice presented to you at the school, whereupon you will be reported if found speaking Nepali.

In the US, I have seen people speak English in all kinds of tones and dialects. I myself am one of them. I have an accent: meaning I sound like I am posing in English. All of us are. And I have seen teenagers forget speaking Nepali after just a year or too, and Middle aged still speaking accented English after 20 something years in the US. The problem here is the mindset. It is, in other words, called stereotyping. We make fun of Indians speak English { I am very good at mimicking them}, and I have been made fun of my English. So, it is a vicious cycle. We make fun of Indians and Mexicans and Americans and Nepricans make fun of us. Simple as that. If you cannot speak English fluently, that is not important. If you cannot speak Nepali fluently {which I bet a lot of people claim they cannot, and I feel for them}, that is no big deal either. As long as your listeners understand you, it really doesn't matter. F**K sounds a lot cooler then C***E, so does churot sounds better than cigarette. It is just a matter of time when we will also speak full fledged Nepinglish.

In the age of globalization, whining about spoken language accomplishes nothing. We should let Nepali remain the first language, and English the second. If you want to develop anything, it is confidence and fluency, in whatever you speak.  Mix all you want, after all, it is you who will have the hangover!!