lunes, 6 de junio de 2016

Being bilingual in your own country

Hi Readers! No, your computer don't have a virus, I'm writing in English because some months ago I saw a video in the channel of Fa (Las palabras de Fa) where she and her sister talked about how they are bilingual in Mexico (or something like that) and I liked the idea so I'm here doing my best, trying to write correctly in English and I'll try to explain you the importance of this language in my daily life in Mexico City.

Here is the video of Fa, if you want you can see it first to know what they were talking about.



Resultado de imagen para estatua de la libertad caricaturaFirst of all, I speak aproximately 75% of English so If I have some mistakes here are because of that and I'd like to tell me in the in the comments my mistakes to correct them.

I speak English since the 8 years (9 years ago) because I took some courses and then I had to take obligatory classes in my school so the half of my life I've talked English and nowadays it's something I'm used to.

I live in the busiest city of Mexico and one of the most visited of the country so a lot of foreigns come everyday and you can find people speaking in English in the streets, especially if you are in some specific places like malls, museums, airports or tourist places, even, you can find people speaking French, German, Chinese, etc. So this is a city where speak other languages never hurts.

However, what motivates us to speak English are all the products that come from The US, including series, movies, music, books, toys, electronic devices wich have instructions in English and if you don't want to confuse the mixer with an acupuncture device it's necessary to learn at least to understand written English.

Resultado de imagen para big ben caricaturaUnfortunately, less than half of the population speaks English and the other half doesn't have a sufficient level of language proficiency.

My family doesn't speak English so I can´t practice with them but my friends speak moreless the same level of the language than me and I sometimes make some jokes or share memes (haha sorry, I don't know the translation of that) in English with them.

In the internet I usually visit some pages or I watch some videos in English so I think I use the language for me, for my own benefit, and yeah, that's how I use the English in my daily life in this country where the most of the people  don't speak English.

I hope that you enjoyed the post and if you liked to I write more posts in English talking about anything tell me in the comments. See you next time.

Bye.

12 comentarios:

  1. Hola^^
    Pues me ha gustado mucho la entrada y escribes muy bien en inglés la verdad. Yo básicamente coincido con lo que dices, aunque en mi caso lo hablo menos porque casi ningún amigo tiene un buen nivel, es decir, lo entienden más o menos bien pero no lo hablan muy bien por lo que hablar solo yo en inglés no tiene mucho sentido.
    Y por mi haz más entradas así, el tema me da igual pero me gusta leerte en inglés :P
    un beso!

    ResponderBorrar
    Respuestas
    1. Hola!
      Gracias ^^
      Es difícil aprender un idioma si no tienes nadie con quien practicarlo.
      Pensaré otros temas para hablar en inglés.

      Saludos.

      Borrar
  2. No creo que nadie lea las instrucciones de los jueguetes, y menos si están en inglés, nomás le mueves por todos lados y quedó, jaja.
    Interesante post, mi duda es ¿por qué ves videos tan antiguos de Fa? XDD

    ResponderBorrar
    Respuestas
    1. Jaja confiemos en que sí hay personas responsables y civilizadas que leen las instrucciones, aunque es verdad, yo no lo hago a menos que sea extremadamente necesario.
      Jaja ese video lo vi cuando salió (cuando aún era joven y no tenía blog jaja) pero hace poco que está revisando las sugerencias de Youtube me apareció y se me ocurrió hacer algo similar.

      Saludos.

      Borrar
  3. Hey!
    I assume that an English post is kind of asking for an English answer so I'll be doing so.
    I really do get you, for me English is like 90% of my life, I'm really proud of my level, especially because no one in my family speaks English fluently and in my country we're not that uses to foreign people, so the only person I can practise with is ME!
    Sometimes I feel like I even like English better that Spanish, altought I really love my language, but I don't know, I feel like I'm so into it that I've ended up living not only the language but the culture, specially from the US... I actually have American accent, which is funny because in my school we have a lot of emphasis in British English, I guess something went wrong.... XD

    I'm really willing to visit a country where people speak English, because altought I've been in other countries and have used English to communicate like in Italy or France, I've never been in the UK or in US and I feel like that's exactly what I need to know if my speaking is good enough to live there.
    Another thing that really caught my attention in the video is how some people get kind of mad when you mix Spanish with English, because I feel like they think tht we're intending to show off our amazing bilingual capacities or something like that... Which it's ridiculous... All I want when I write/ speak in Spanish is to open my mind to another culture, instead of just read/ listen what's in Spanish. That's why I tend to read books in their original language, I even feel like it's respect to the author, I don't know, maybe it's just me.

    I really like this post! :)

    ResponderBorrar
    Respuestas
    1. Wow 90% is amazing, even I've taken classes for 9 years it's really hard for me learn some aspects of the language (e.g. modal verbs) so I really admire you English level.
      Are you from Spain, it isn't? I Thought in that country there wwould be more people speaking English because all the near countries speak other languages and like the English is the univeral language.
      I really like Spanish because it's like a challenge for me, it's more difficul than English and altough I speak Spanish everyday, all the day there are many thing that I don't know and I'm alway learning new things about it.
      One of the things that I like languages is the culture. Learn about new cultures is something that I really enjoy and if I can learn it in the original language better for me.
      I have American accent too because here, the school focus in that accente due to we are next to US but I'll like to learn a little bit more abour the accent and teh culture of UK.
      I try to don't mix both languages because of the problem that I told but sometimes it's impossible and necessary say something in other language ans I hate when people looks you weird.
      I've only read one book in English and it wasn't difficult but I've tried with others and I can't, it's something hard for me.
      Thank you for your comment.

      Borrar
    2. Actually I'm from Colombia but now I'm living in Spain, and I also thought that there would be more people speaking in English here, but the thing is that in here people are like really "proud" of tier language and so they tend to pronunciate everything. Just the way it's written, so their pronunciation isn't really good. In latinamerica is a whole lot better.

      Borrar
    3. Jaja I've noticed that, I've heard Spanish spekaing Engish and it's very funny, they have a peculiar pronunciation (I hope that Spanish aren't reading this) and I think I have a good pronunciation and many people here in Mexico have a clear pronunciation.

      Borrar
  4. Hola :)
    Escribís muy bien Alberto! Yo me defiendo bastante leyéndolo y escribiéndolo pero hablar es mi punto débil. En mi cabeza me sale bárbaro, pero cuando voy a abrir la boca me quedo en blanco y no me sale nada. Muy fea situación, en especial cuando tenes que dar un oral en inglés o algo por el estilo :/ Lamentablemente no tengo a nadie a mano para poder practicar, seguiré hablando sola :P
    Saludos!

    ResponderBorrar
    Respuestas
    1. Hola!
      Gracias ^^
      A mi lo que más me cuesta es escucharlo, sobre todo si no es el acento americano, todavía ese lo domino un poco pero cuando escucho a un británico a un australiano me pierdo y no entiendo ni pío.
      Y bueno lo de las presentaciones hasta en español me bloqueo así que ya te imaginas en inglés.

      Saludos.

      Borrar
  5. Hi there!

    I didn't know people living in Mexico City used English that much!
    I speak English since I was 3 (that is... 16 years ago moreless hahaha) but I hardly use it here in Spain; (I always used English only when traveling abroad) I would say, there is only like a 10-20% of the population who can speak (properly) in English in here.
    I actually think there are more English speakers in Mexico than in Spain.

    On the other hand, since I live in Catalonia, I can tell you a bit about a "fully" bilingual land. We are bilingual Catalan-Spanish and like 90-95% of the population speaks/understands both languages; Something I really find funny is it when, for example, there are two people talking and one speaks Catalan and the other one speaks Spanish and they understand each other with no problem!
    Instructions, ingredients of food, etc. all these things come always in both languages too. Movies and series are however always dubbed in both languges.
    I think, being bilingual in your own country is a really beatiful thinkg!

    Well, I really liked your post and I encourage you to write more posts in English!!

    See you soon!

    ResponderBorrar
  6. Hi!
    Moreless, the people in the border between Mexico and US speaks a lot of English and here it' like less than half of the population speaks a good level of Englosh but it's useful to learn that language.
    I thought in Spain will be more Engish speaker than here but another girl and you told me the opposite, and that's so wonderful because here we don't speak a lot and if in Spain the people speaks less than here it's so bad.
    Haha, that sounds very funny I want to visit Catalonia (I didn't know how to say that in English XD) and I really want to learn catalan because it sounds so beautiful.
    I think so too and I really want to learn a lot of languages even I won't use but it's beautiful.

    See you soon.

    ResponderBorrar

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