At the risk of sounding conceited, I have often been complimented for my good command of the English language and people even ask if I am from the United Kingdom. When told I'm from Singapore, they ask if I've been to the UK. They get very surprised when I tell them no.
I shared not too long ago that
Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist was probably responsible for rekindling my passion for reading, especially those not of the picture books genre. 1987 seemed to have been quite the milestone year for me since it was that same year that I discovered my first love - the English language.
English is not my mother tongue, although ironically it is labelled as a first language in schools here, with your mother tongue as a second language. When I was in primary school, I was able to get the general gist of the language though truth be told, I barely understood half the things that were being taught or spoken to me. In fact, it took me years to realise that "comprehension" is an actual word that means something rather than just the name of a subject in school.
This has always been a bone of contention with me since I feel that the way they teach English here is not by comprehension but by memorization so most often than not, you know it's spoken that way but you barely have an understanding of why it is so. I noticed that most acutely when I started working where I am now and saw how the kids were taught. The method used here seem so flawless and quick to understand that I was left in awe!
I could easily manage spoken English with its broken grammar and culturally mixed flavours - popularly known as Singlish here. However, as I was the firstborn and my parents' command of the language was manageable but not exactly stellar, I didn't think much of it. Then when I was 13, I bought myself a small radio and stumbled upon this station where they spoke English differently than how it was spoken here. "You're listening to the BBC World service" became a tagline that was so familiar and the station soon became my favourite for the year.
Now being a TV-holic, I watched a lot of TV but you know how it is when it's drama and such, it's never proper English spoken unless you watch a lot of news and documentary. I don't think there were even any foreign news stations available here at the time, and the documentaries that I may have watched probably saw me riveted on the subject matter itself rather than what was being spoken.
To say I was stupefied would probably be an understatement but I was definitely amazed to hear people speaking like that when not reading the news or narrating a documentary. Furthermore, since it was just an aural attack on my senses, it had an even greater impact. I recall moments when I just laid in bed letting the words flow through me.
I soon began reading up on English and England. I figured if I wanted to learn it right, I should go to the source instead of picking up American English that was so evident on TV. Of course there was the matter of Singapore having been a British colony in the past so we are taught the Queen's English here - that was the general understanding though the results could not exactly be termed thus.
In any case, I spent hours just devouring up what I could on English history either via documentaries, TV series or reading at the library; and paid close attention to the manner of speech whenever I watched British programmes. It was not long before I was lapping up stories about King Arthur and his round table, William of Normandy, King Henry VIII etc.
Fictitious stories of Ivanhoe and Robin Hood appealed to me as well. I must have watched several versions of these adaptations and soon knew the stories by heart - my favourite version of Ivanhoe is the one with Anthony Andrews. This also led to my fascination with history. Yes, it started with English history! A lot could be said about Castles, knights and mansions; they are just so captivating!
At about the same time, a British mini-series was shown on TV entitled Jane Eyre with Timothy Dalton as Mr Rochester. Ooh la la, I was clearly smitten! So I picked up a copy of Jane Eyre and Charlotte Bronte was the next classic writer that I knew off aside from Charles Dickens. That particular copy of Jane Eyre was so well-read that when the bindings fell off, I lovingly hole-punched the pages and it became a little bound book, LOL.
I was so enthralled with the whole world of the English language and England that I started speaking English with an accent, well not quite an English accent but a proper-English accent. I recall my classmates looking at me funnily though the nice ones appreciated the difference and asked me a time or two to try speaking with my "English accent".
I totally shunned Singlish and even now, it hurts my ears hearing too much of it. It grates even more on my senses when I hear my peers butchering the language. I'm not demeaning anyone nor am I thinking highly of myself, but we all learned the same thing in school; proper diction, grammar structure etc - as well as could be anyway since they were taught by teachers who sometimes used too much Singlish - so the least we could do is speak with proper clarity! There is really no excuse for speaking badly and to in turn pass that on to the next generation. It's truly deplorable and such an insult to a wonderful language!
But I digress. I am beyond thrilled to have discovered the real English and I have nothing but respect and admiration for the work they do on the BBC World Service. Thank you, I am forever indebted!
