Like your average sixteen (okay, fifteen and nine months) year old, I devote much of my time looking back upon my childhood. Its refreshing and somewhat displeasing to discover how little I knew about life back then. I look though my old diary entries, for instance, and instead of finding relevant things like I played badminton today I find stuff like I was torning the paper.
Let's take a moment here and acknowledge the fact that I am well versed with the English language. I do not support the use of improper grammar, nor am I a poor orator. I wirte poems, and one was published in the newspaper as well. (He who brags has little to brag about. Also, um, am I insecure or what.)
Having said that, I was not born reciting Wordsworth as one would have naturally thought. Inspite of living in London for a year when I was one, by the time I was one or two or maybe three, I could only communicate crookedly by inventing words like "Ponkha" meaning of course, popcorn, and "Ishish" meaning ice cream. I'm pretty sure the only legitimate English words I knew were "okay" and "shut up", so that was something to be proud of. I was a pretty confident and happy child so little bothered me. Things became uncomfortable after an incident that changed my childhood.
It was a bright sunny morning in May. Maybe, I don't actually remember. I was five. I was talking to my friends about the usual businesses in life, when my friend said the word 'marriage' and I froze. Marriage? What a peculiar sounding word. Oh no. Everyone was nodding. How did evryone know what the bloody word meant? What was I supposed to do? I was only 5, and unprepared for such worldy affairs. My friends noticed that I was hyperventilating and they sensed something was wrong. You're five years old, and you don't know what marriage means? They said with looks of disgust. The words stung. I blinked away my tears. I drew myself to my full height, which, wasn't a lot, and looked them in the eye and said with as much dignity as I could muster at that point; We're not supposed to know so much English yet.
*
Basically, by this post, I made two points-
1) If you ever feel like you haven't accomplished much, remind yourself that you knew the meaning of marriage.
2) If you need a good comeback, do not contact me.
Let's take a moment here and acknowledge the fact that I am well versed with the English language. I do not support the use of improper grammar, nor am I a poor orator. I wirte poems, and one was published in the newspaper as well. (He who brags has little to brag about. Also, um, am I insecure or what.)
Having said that, I was not born reciting Wordsworth as one would have naturally thought. Inspite of living in London for a year when I was one, by the time I was one or two or maybe three, I could only communicate crookedly by inventing words like "Ponkha" meaning of course, popcorn, and "Ishish" meaning ice cream. I'm pretty sure the only legitimate English words I knew were "okay" and "shut up", so that was something to be proud of. I was a pretty confident and happy child so little bothered me. Things became uncomfortable after an incident that changed my childhood.
It was a bright sunny morning in May. Maybe, I don't actually remember. I was five. I was talking to my friends about the usual businesses in life, when my friend said the word 'marriage' and I froze. Marriage? What a peculiar sounding word. Oh no. Everyone was nodding. How did evryone know what the bloody word meant? What was I supposed to do? I was only 5, and unprepared for such worldy affairs. My friends noticed that I was hyperventilating and they sensed something was wrong. You're five years old, and you don't know what marriage means? They said with looks of disgust. The words stung. I blinked away my tears. I drew myself to my full height, which, wasn't a lot, and looked them in the eye and said with as much dignity as I could muster at that point; We're not supposed to know so much English yet.
*
Basically, by this post, I made two points-
1) If you ever feel like you haven't accomplished much, remind yourself that you knew the meaning of marriage.
2) If you need a good comeback, do not contact me.
I can't even begin to fathom the trauma you must have gone through at that tender age of 5,but i must compliment you on having overcome your handicap of the language and how!!!!
ReplyDeleteThankyou aunty! It was pretty tough,since I suffered a setback at such a young age, but I've always been pretty over confident and satisfied with myself for no reason at all, so I got over it soon. :)
ReplyDelete