As fiercely in love as I am with this tongue, I have had to rein it in. Living in Chennai and having to haggle with auto drivers on a daily basis does that to you - do you have any idea how much they charge otherwise? I learnt to imitate the coarser rhythms of Madras Tamil out of the need for defense - like a stereotypical Ceylonese, I keep my allegiances close but my wallet closer still.

Still, it's an accent that never fails to surprise me. The affirmative om that perks up in place of the ama I've conditioned myself to use in India. The fact that I cannot bring myself to use the personal nee when the neenga I am used to is just that much more pleasingly polite, and somehow, to my ears, more intimate. My accent gives me away when I least expect it to, like a blush-inducing pinch that makes sure I don't forget. Just like how my v's and w's mix when I argue in English, any Tamil conversation in which I wholly participate is jazzed up (or if you'll excuse the blatant exoticism, baila-d up) with my real accent. The one I had before I knew it was an accent.

My accent is too pretty to make fun of, I think. But some of my island-inflected vocabulary isn't.

When I was 18, I spent half a year living with my local grandmother. Bless her, for she tried her best to take care of this half-and-half foreign-returnee. I think her patience was sorely tested by a few incidents in the kitchen (which is not called quisine here - sigh!), in particular.

I wanted some paan, I told her once, incurring her disdain. Paan, as far as I knew, was bread. Paan, as far as she knew, was betelnut. Not getting the hint, I tried to describe a sandwich. Finally, a wave of clarity broke upon her face and she exclaimed, "You mean roti!". But roti, as far as I knew, was what's known here as the Malabar paratha.

Equally flummoxing was when I asked for kochikai (chilli, to the Ceylonese). "What you mean", someone corrected me, is "mizhagai". "No", I insisted. "That's pepper!"

But the linguistic faux pas that I didn't stop using until literally months ago is the one that takes the cake.

Grand old Ceylonese ammammas, at least in my experience, greet children by grabbing their chins, sniffing both cheeks, and muttering in rapturous tones, "Enda kunju!" Or (once again, to show you how little I knew), "my little one". Fancying myself a grand young Ceylonese lady, it's a term of endearment I also use to embellish my speech.

Imagine my glee and horror when my very irate sister informed me recently that kunju, as far as Indian Tamil is concerned, means penis.

So don't blame me for my dirty mind. It's genetic.

I love that my Ceylonese accent gives me away, because years and years from the first home of my childhood in Colombo, not so far away at all from losing my grandparents, it's one of my dearest possessions. An accent like the surprise of sweet in mango pickle, I wrote in a poem once. So leave me to my broken Tamil and my quaintly scandalous expressions in it. It's one of the few ways that I know how to love and remember love.

An edited version appeared in The New Indian Express. “The Venus Flytrap” is my weekly column in the Zeitgeist supplement. Previous columns can be found here.

I have three southern-belle type cousins who used to visit every few summers from Kentucky.  We spent most of the visits engaged in a battle about who had an accent!  My cousins said things like 'tennis shoes' (sneakers), 'wreck' (car accident), 'pop' (soda), and Y'ALL (no direct translation).

They had nasal twangs and drawls that I'd never heard outside of The Dukes of Hazzard.  I finally won the battle of the accents by stating, "I speak like the people on television and you don't."  This silenced the belles and the argument was won.

Years later, I befriended a wholesome Midwestern girl at a job.  KKB hailed from Wisconsin and said adorable things like, "Ooooh" and "Dontcha".  She moved back to West-consin a few years ago, but we still talk and her accent is more entrenched than ever! 

At another job, I met a guy with an Irish accent and was smitten!  What is it about a brogue that makes me swoon?!  This guy was not attractive, but when he spoke, I got dizzy.  He said things like, "I cycled to the park this weekend." CYCLED! I loved it! 

Do you have an accent?  I mean, I know you don't have an accent in your head, but when compared to the rest of the population, do you?  Do you speak like Blanche on the Golden Girls?  Or more like Rose?  Do tell.

I am sure to smile each time I discover it for years to come... Thanks Bon!

Since our client was a telecommunication company, the word 'Mobile' came up extremely frequently during our discussions. It was very interesting to notice how different people pronounced the word differently. In brief, people from the US pronounce the word as 'Moble' (rhymes with 'Noble'). The rest of the world pronounce it as 'Mobile' (rhymes with 'File').

This means all the representatives from our client said 'Moble', as for most of our US colleagues. The only exception was a colleague with an Indian heritage. On the Canadian side, 3 out of 4 of us actually spoke English as a second language. Somehow, we naturally adopted to 'Moble' right from the beginning of the project. We just follow how the client said it with no complaint. The only person insisted on saying 'Mobile' was a native Canadian (meaning born and raised in Canada).

I came back to Toronto afterwards and talked with my boss about the project. She was another native Canadian, so she said 'Mobile'. But then I found myself kept on saying 'Moble' and couldn't switch it back!

I remember I was in another project many years ago. The team consisted of mostly Americans, with only a few of us from Canada. There was an issue with a database flag 'Z'. Our US colleagues would say 'zee', but our Canadian colleagues, in attempt to keep up with our Canadian pride, would say 'zed'. Somehow, everyone insisted on pronouncing it his own way and no one bothered to suggest to unify the pronunciations at least in the discussions. At one point, I was shocked to hear my team lead, a native Canadian, began to say 'zee'. From then on, I knew we had lost the wrestling.

As a matter of fact, the 'Z' alphabet was once used as a Shibboleth. It was
known in American history and popular culture for distinguishing American males who fled to Canada from the US to escape the military draft in the 1960s. But thanks to the American cultural influences in the past few decades, such as Sesame Street and the Alphabet song (American version), 'zee' is now adopted more and more by many young Canadians.

Okay, I'm pretty much just talking about Tommy Smyth.

And honestly, I don't know enough about soccer to know if he has any idea of what he's talking about. But I seem to know enough to understand what he's talking about.

Plus he's got a cool accent.

And let's face it folks, accents are awesome.  His Irish accent is so pronounced it's like listening to a Lucky from Lucky Charms announce a game.

That's vaguely racist, but whatever, it's awesome.

And soccer is awesome too. I've always paid attention to the world cup and the euro league stuff, but my dad finally got me into the EPL this year. You know a sport is good when there's a team named after a beer. And newcastle is a damn fine beer.

Out, bitches.

but which is her real one?

Those who use RP, among others:

• Actors: Hugh Grant, David Niven, John Cleese, Patrick Stewart (Captain Picard), etc
• Simon Cowell
• The BBC from the 1920s to the 1970s
• Top schools and universities, like Oxford and Cambridge
• Tory MPs

About two million people in Britain speak RP. For them it is the natural way of speaking. For many who learned English as a foreign language it is the right way to say words, the way you see in British dictionaries, like the Oxford English Dictionary.

RP was the voice of power and authority in the 1930s, but by the 1990s it had become the voice of the stuck-up.

Tony Blair, for example, still spoke RP in the 1980s but by the 1990s he was speaking in Estuary English, an everyman's London English which is halfway between RP and working-class Cockney.

RP was never the accent of the masses. That was kind of the idea. But for most of the 1900s it was how the top people in all parts of the country spoke. It was how you learned to speak if you went to the top schools and universities, like Eton, Oxford and Cambridge. Eton was said to have the purest RP accent.

RP only tells people that you have a very good education, but not where you are from. You cannot even say an RP speaker is from Britain since most are from overseas.

There was no RP in the 1700s. We know that from Samuel Johnson's dictionary. There was not even a single accent among the rich and powerful back then. That arose in the 1800s with the rise of English public schools (meaning the private schools of the rich).

Lord Reith based BBC English on RP. He saw it as the right way of speaking and wanted the BBC to set an example. It was also the accent that everyone, rich or poor, north or south, native or foreign, understood. That was true before the BBC, but the BBC made it even more true.

You can still hear RP on the BBC, especially on the news, but it started to move away from it in the 1970s.

RP has changed over time. We know that from hearing the old news broadcasts of the BBC. You can also hear it in Angelina Jolie's character in "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow", who speaks in an RP from the 1930s. So RP is not some timeless accent. It changes like everything else.

See also:

• English
• Standard English
• England
• Britain
• Oxford English Dictionary
• Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow

(Yes, "pop." Look at the drink. Do you see bubbles popping, or sodaing? You bake with soda, you drink pop.)

Anyway, the conversation went like this--

Me: "How's it going?"
Him: "Pretty good. Our work was mostly front-loaded this episode."
Me: "Yeah?"
Him: "Yeah. Everybody's waiting on us. Always a lot of pressure."
Me: "I imagine."
Him: "It's a big push to get it all done, but once it is, it'll feel good to have the deck cleared."
Me: "Mm hm."
Him: "Well, I better get back to it. You know how it is."

Except... I didn't.

I had no idea who this guy was, what his department was, or what the hell he was talking about. I kinda recognized his face, but he could have been talking about serial murder for all I know.

Why do people assume I know them? I find myself acting like the guy from Memento, nodding and pretending to know them, just to avoid the awkwardness.

I suppose I could try to learn their names, but... Well, I guess, technically, I could care less. I'm just not sure how.

I spoke with "Amanda," clearly from India with love, who spoke a mile a minute. I have no idea what the heck she said. I presume it doesn't matter as long as the bloody letter is sent to the verified address.

For the love of God people, we all speak English with different accents, so maybe it would be helpful if there is a bit of slowing down in the speech department, you know so we all can make sure that we understand each other. Maybe down shift, to oh lets say 3/4 of a mile a minute....cause you know we don't interact with people with an Indian accent here on a regular basis so we don't have the accent down, YET. But we will though. To think of it, I have no issues understanding my friends SK and SG who are both from India. We do just fine, the only thing I suppose is that they don't speak a mile a minute.

Somehow I have a feeling that one of these days when we call 411 or 911 we will be connected to India or the Philippines. I can just see calling 911 for a shooting in front of my house and speaking with a dispatcher in India who is going to contact the LAPD in San Pedro...lets just hope that there is no miscommunication while the info flies from Pedro to India and then back to Pedro. As far as 411 goes, thank God for goog411 and their robot who speaks American English.

Am I alone to think that this is so freaking annoying? I have much respect for Indian English, but seriously, there is need for common intelligibility here. Just a little suggestions from lil' ol' me.

http://www.gosquared.com/liquidicity/archives/172

(thoughtful pause) "I think theyre gonna win in five.  I'll give the Lakers one."

"I'm gonna be honest guys, I don't wanna take anything away from the Celtics, but this Laker team is way overrated.  Theyre just not that good."

"I said all along the Celtics were gonna win this series.  I don't think the series is coming back to Boston."

and blah blah blah.  I like that everyone around here is seemingly ignoring the national coverage that still gives the lakers a very solid chance to win this thing, especially because everyone is banking on Kobe shooting like 20 free throws in game 3.  I love the thick Boston/ Rhode Island accents telling me I'm wrong because I don't have enough confidence in my sports teams. It didn't use to be like this.  Stuff changed after 2004.

It's good to be home.

(Postscript: Lost in all this NBA hoopla, did you guys see that the Sparks have lost TWO games?  What the hell is going on down there?!)

Picture me, watching the movie, Cold Mountain, starring Nicole Kidman, Rene Zellwegger, Jude Law, and directed by Anthony Minghella. Yes, by myself and on my own volition. No excuses. It was an epicene thing to do, but I did it anyways. Because that's how I roll.

It was a good movie. It had a dreamy literary romantic feel to it. I enjoyed it. But you have to be in the mood for a slow emotionally ridden movie. After an exhausting two week trial is a good place to start. It's even better when it's like 2 in the morning and there's nothing on television (and I'm including cable) and you messed up your netflix mailing system so now all of your movies are in transit somewhere. And it's raining.

So I was enjoying this Civil War-era epic/romance, until, of course, that idiot, Jude Law, who plays a Confederate soldier returning from the war (read: southerner), completely ruins a scene and in a way, the movie. Now it was a stretch in the first place to think of Jude Law as a southerner, because I didn't hear anything remotely southern coming out of him (I grew up in Kentucky, kinda close to North Carolina, but not really, but enough to know). He kept a neutral accent for the most part during the movie. (I mean I suppose if you had Vivien Leigh play Scarlett O'Hara, anything is possible).

The part of the movie where he confronts Union soldiers at Natalie Portman's (and I mean her character's) place, he yells out, [I'm paraphrasing here], "GET OUT OF HE-AH!!" IN A FULL BRITISH ACCENT. He might have had added the phrase, "by order of the his majesty, the KING!!!"

[Editor's Note:  Michelle told me that my paraphrase of the phrase in question as incorrect.  So I watched the relevant scene again -- and she is correct.  Jude Law's character declares (still in a BRITISH ACCENT), "MOVE AH-WAY FROM THE BAH-BEE!!"  And he continues to break accent afterwards.  I stand corrected insofar as my quotation is concerned, but I am still correct in my assertion that Jude Law is an actor without much range, in terms of accents and acting in general.]

I will hold onto irrational things and use it to wage a war of unrequited hate against a person -- especially actors. And that's why I think Jude Law sucks ass. Great acting Jude. Note sarcasm.

Granted, maybe the director should have caught it, but Anthony Minghella's British, so it probably sounded fine to him. Charles Frazier is silently stabbing his fountain pen into a little Jude Law doll.

So, if he can't keep an accent, then who can?

1. Gwyneth Paltrow is by far the BEST example of an American actress who has an impeccable British accent. It's awesome. AWESOME. You just have to watch Sliding Doors to really understand how she has it down. Good movie. In addition, you can see Emma and a movie called Shakespeare in Love (which won for best picture the same year Saving Private Ryan came out and I thought was a missed call by the Academy, but upon having watched it a few times, I can see why Shakespeare in Love really appealed to those appreciate great writing as oppposed to the most pyrotechnic opening sequence in a movie to date).

2. Angelina Jolie. Pretty good. Tomb Raider. She's also hot (which is why she's up here at #2). I'm a big fan. Her British accent is pretty good (it broke only once in the sequel to Tomb Raider). But I don't think it's been tested in the way Paltrow was tested with three heavy British scripts with lots of dialogue.

3. Kate Winslet. She's just an all around great actress. Her work speaks for itself. And of course, I mean her American accent (The Titanic, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind). And her Australian accent (Holy Smoke!). And her Kiwi accent, Heavenly Creatures (although if I remember correctly, Kate's character's family was British, but there was enough of the New Zealander in there to convince me -- not that I'm an expert).

4. Cate Blanchett. Her Natasha-from-Rocky-and-Bullwinkle-esque act from the latest Indiana Jones movie notwithstanding, she can apparently do any accent. Queen's British, American, Katherine Hepburn's English, etcetera. I didn't know for years that she was AUSTRALIAN. Wow.

5. Nicole Kidman. Her performance in the above, Cold Mountain, as a southerner was passable (but being next to Jude Law made her seem AWESOME). But generally speaking, I first noticed her in To Die For, where she plays a cunning mid-western weather girl -- sounded utterly American.

6. Kenneth Branagh, Mr. ex-Royal Shakespeare Company has a damn good American accent. I won't tell you to watch Wild, Wild, West, but rather, Dead Again. Great movie (and in happier times with Emma Thompson). We can't expect Jude Law to be like Kenneth Branagh, but I sure he tried.

And as a side note, everyone's Korean accent on the TV show "Lost" is utterly horrible, except for the actress who plays Sun. She is played by Yunjin Kim and she apparently had a career here in the States before going back to Korea to do TV and a movie (Shiri, which put her on the map). So, one can expect her Korean accent to be pretty authentic. But she plays someone who speaks semi-broken-English with a Korean accent, and it doesn't sound like some ridiculous Margaret Cho monlogue. And since her English is pretty flawless (outside of the TV show), that's a pretty good acting job.

The whole point is that this thing about accents is that it's really important if you can tell the difference. The majority of English speakers here in the US can't tell how well or not well Korean is being spoken. A lot of American English speakers can't tell the difference between an Australian accent, Queen's English, Cockney, or a Kiwi one. But sometimes, when you can tell or think you can tell, the inability of certain people to covince you of the authenticity of what they're delivering, is incredibly annoying.

And that means you Jude Law . . .

Apologies KM, NW, LC, BB, SM, JB

This week's focus: Marking Tips

We decided to discuss useful tips when marking work as a result of the last meeting where SM showed us some stickers that she had made herself with common comments she would use when marking.

Useful ideas from this session:

1. Write a question, rather than telling them what's wrong. EG. Instead of Becareful with verb endings! (in TL or otherwise), What's the ending of an er verb in the the 3rd person? This can then be followed up and checked in later lessons.
2. Using a bank of marking comments across the department, or using set phrases that are cognates, EG It is necessary to...You must...Careful with..etc.
3. Another school's marking policy involves writing three points at the end of every piece of work. The first comment is written next to a tick in a circle and has positive comments next to it, then the is an exclamation mark inside a triangle has comments on what the pupil must be careful with, and finally, an arrow pointing upwards with ways of improving next to it. They also include an NC level on the work.
4. Two stars and a wish - the teacher must write two positive comments (two stars) and one thing that they must improve upon (the wish). No grade is given, as pupils will always focus on the grade, rather than the comments, which, from a teacher's point of view, can be rather annoying as it can take such a long time to write comments for every pupil's work.
5. Merits - last meeting the use of merits was discussed, and the fact that the merit stickers from www.mystickers.co.uk can be worth points. Pupils collect the merits, input the code from the sticker into their account on the website to get points, and can win prizes the more points they have.
6. Frog Merits (and Fish Merits). HF's school have been giving out Frog Merits in French, for good use of TL. These get labelled with the pupil's details, and put into a raffle that is drawn regularly. Fish merits have now been introduced to German (H Fish!).

We also discussed the English system of not only NC levels, but GCSE level grades, and A Level grades. It was noted that in Spain the system 1-10 is used (with 10 being the highest) and in Germany 1-6 (or 1-15 at higher levels) is used.

AOB/Golden Nuggets

Organising & Filing - How do we all file and organise ourselves? We all have multiple places where we can store electronic files (USB stick, My Documents at School, School shared area, home computer) and it can get a bit complicated. We all use different methods, and are trying to find one that suits us the most. Some teachers also have paper copies of everything and keep things both at home and at school, although with most of us moving away from OHTs the majority of things used are electronic.

Accent Codes - It was noted that in PowerPoint one can't use the 'control' shortcut keys for accents. Other ways of putting accents that work in PowerPointwould be

• to use the ALT codes
• changing the keyboard to another language (if you know the layout of the foreign keyboard). For more information and handy hints click here or here.
• using a small program that always has the main accents that you use for your language onscreen (F Keys was mentioned or a quick Google search brought up Mophy Software - a free program).

OHT vs Whiteboards - The question: Do any of us still use acetates in class? The answer: Yes, ocassionally, especially just to do something different, to recycle good resources, or just to allow the pupils to have more control in front of the class. It was acknowledged that we all really liked to get the pupils to write on to acetate, and display their work via the OHP.

Mentioned the importance of blogging ( :-) ) to gain ideas. Isabell Jones, via her blog, has recently set herself an IWB Challenge, where she has to use the IWB in a new way once a week.

Finally GoogleMyWay was mentioned as a way to engage your class. It allows you to customise the word that appears at the top of the page. Here's one I made earlier.

NEXT MEETING

The next meeting is undecided at this moment, however we need to say goodbye to NM who moves to Spain this summer for work, so we are considering a more social evening in Preston. I will update with details when they are known.

SLL

I've lived in Mexico for a while now.  I've recently noticed that I do the following:

I'll be walking down the street, on a ruta (bus) in a taxi.

There will be a blond, fair-skinned person walking down the street. And I'll catch myself staring. It doesn't matter if I think that person is good-looking or not. It is about their blondness. Their whiteness.

I don't do this with friends here in Mexico who are blonde and fair-skinned. I don't sit and stare at them. But if I don't know them, I'll twist my head to keep looking at them, long after my bus/taxi/feet has passed them.

When I do catch myself, I get grouchy. Yep, I know-surely my own internalized oppression comes out to play at those moments.

But then when I'm in the States, I don't stare in that way.

In the States, I'll often stare at someone, blonde or not, because I'm caught up with their voice, how they speak. I'll stare, because I'm fascinated/disgusted/combination of the two, by someone's accent, or what they are saying, or their rhythm in saying it. I stare at them, because I'm listening.

But here in Mexico, I stare at the blonde strangers because I'm staring. I'm projecting shit.  They are voiceless.

How 'bout 'dem apples?

Ouch.

"cc a tous lachez moi des com’s svp je fé une offre juska ce soir juska 21 00 tt les com’s son doublé et sur ceux ou les com’s son doublé et ben il son rendu triple c pa une blague je le fé c juré merci a ceux ki iront + si vou me metté en fav c 10 com’s en plus bsx!!!"

Atroce, hein ? J'en ai ras-le-bol de cette écriture épouvantable, et de ce maudit raccourci pour commentaires, "com's" ! Ça fait tellement franchouillard, c'est dans la même lignée idiote que "slip" au lieu de sous-vêtements... Pire, le mot "fais" est ici remplacé par "fé", ce qui n'est même pas correct comme substitution phonétique; encore une bévue d'Européens sans doute, ils ne comprennent pas que "fais" se prononce "fè" (notez l'accent grave) et non "fé". Pénible...

It's 1st June.

Half year has gone by.

173 days left till my final exams. Less than 4 months.

Oh, I was told on Friday by my year 12 coordinator that she nominated me for a scholarship in Deakin University. No idea about the details. It probably isn't so much. And i probably wouldn't get the requirements for it anyways.

A little to do list for the month:

• June 11th - ENGLISH SACS DUE (3 responsive essays 500 words each plus explanatory paragraphs) Also - Dental appointment for checking up on braces (to see if it all going okay before it gets taken out)
• June 12th - Psychology Exam & Chemistry Exam. [ALSO, english practice exam?]
• June 13th - GAT (General Assessment Test) for 3 hours.
• June 16th - Maths SAC 2
• June 24th - BRACES OFF :D
• June 27th - Holidays begin. (Or I should say, School break)

Last month is a month of changes. I've possibly dealt with as much shit i could have gotten in a month. Now this month? It's crunchtime.

Oh, Work last night was absolutely horrible. I just made one mistake. Got one order wrong. But you know, waitressing sucks. You get to deal with horrible customers and basically you cop all the shit. Including if the customers are jerks or including if the kitchen got the wrong order. But at the same time, you get all the orders, you deliver it to kitchen. If you get the orders wrong, your mistakes will affect the kitchen as well.

And i made one order mistake. Partially it was the customers fault as well. i repeated the order and they confirmed it. But when the food came out, it was wrong. Another disadvantage: you cannot complain that the customers are wrong. Because "the customers are always right" And some people just take advantage of that and be assholes.

Moving on from that, you know the reason why I've been blogging lately so much? It Is pretty trivial.

BLOG STATS.

I've been getting pretty good rating so far these past few weeks and everytime i see like a very steep decline? I cannot bare seeing it so I blog. And up it goes again :]

Oh, For those of you who actually wants to hear my (current) accent?

Well, I recorded this little snippet, explaining this post's title as well, but really it's because a couple of people wanted to hear my accent. So. I'm gonna load it up. CLICK

Oh, don't freak out, like Elena did. {Oh: this is a different recording}

Well, if you bother to download and listen, comment me :]

"if you don't ask for something,
you can't expect it to happen"
Why didn't you?

Anyhoo, the thing is, in the last year or so I've been feeling a bit unsettled, a tad restless, a little bored, trapped, stagnant. And it's not because I've been single. Okay, partly that. But whatever the reason, it feels like I've stayed here for too long. Especially after TM went to Uni in Brissie and m' moved back to VN, and I was left here on my own after that short stint in Sydney. Feels like I need to move. Maybe back to VN? Maybe to France? Botswana? Finland? Antarctica? Somewhere. Anywhere. Out of here.

Yet how can ten years be that long? Other people live in a town for their whole life. They grow up and go to school and go to work. And they get married and have cute little kiddies who in turn grow up and have more cute little kiddies. And they travel a bit, and retire and go dancing in a church hall and grow things in the backyard. And they're happy. Genuinely happy.

And here is me, a decade in one place and already getting itchy feet. Why this strange need to move about? Yet at the same time wanting to feel secure, stable, settled. It's so contradicting it gave me a splitting headache. Then I really sat down and thought about it, about BaMẹ and the 3 of us. And it dawned on me like a lighting flash. Because we're a bunch of nomads, that's why. Sometimes by choice, other times not. But we've moved around. And as often happens, when you're naturally bound to do something all the time, especially when deep down you know it's not necessarily good for you, you also secretly wish you could stop doing it. Like eating too much chocolate. Or buying too many books. Or falling in love with the wrong person.

Anyway, back to the topic. Here is a little summary of our journeys, so far:

Before BaMẹ met -- Ba was born in one town in the North, grew up in another, moved to Hà Nội after Uni, worked as a marine engineer on commercial freight ships for about 15 years, during which time he travelled to roughly 35 countries. (He used to be away for 10-14 months at a stretch when I was little. It was a tremendously difficult time for all.) Mẹ grew up in a village in Central VN, until the age of 10 when she and her sister were transfered to Hà Nội. (Because of the war, they had to travel ON FOOT for over 3 months, through the jungle, across half the country, to get to HN. This is a looong novel in itself. Maybe one day when we're up for it, I'll sit her down and write her story.) Mẹ stayed in a boarding school there until 18, went to Uni in Ukraine for 6 years. Then back to HN to work.

After they got married, we lived in HN until I was 6 and m' was 2. Then we all relocated to HCMC where TM was born. Then I moved to Melbourne at the ripe old age of 17. Three years later, m' came here. And another three years later, TM arrived. At which point we all had a vision of the 5 of us living in Melb together. But apparently, and unfortunately, the power that be had different plans for us. So somehow TM moved to Brisbane. m' went back to VN. I hopped to Sydney. BaMẹ still in VN. Then I came back to Melb. Then m' came back to Melb. And WE'RE STILL ALL OVER THE PLACE! Like the same poles of some magnets -- desperately trying to come close, yet still pushing apart. :(

If all that moving back and forth didn't make your head dangerously spin at an alarming speed yet, then you should definitely go and apply to be an astronaut! Really! Coz I'm getting all dizzy at my own story. Anyway, so right now m''s plan is to go back next year and live in VN again, to be near BaMẹ. TM's plan is to come back to Melb after Uni for a bit, then go to Europe or somewhere. And me, I'm not sure about me yet. *sigh*

So this constant need to be "out and about" seems to have been engrained into each of us, without our even realising it. Many would comment on how lucky we are, to be able to go places. And I'd agree, to a certain extent. Because as with almost everything else in life, there's a good side, and there's a not-so-good side. It is a privilege because we've been here and there, we've seen things, expanded our knowledge. That's made us more independent, adaptive, accepting. But it also can sometimes be a curse. It's developed in us a fear of airports, yet inevitably draws us to them. It's created in us a false sense of belonging, to many places, yet actually to nowhere. It makes us feel the deepest pain in this quote "Do you understand the sadness of geography?" (from the movie "The English Patient")

Yet the worst thing, to me, is this sense of self-created unsettledness, uncertainty, unrest. The Different Grass Syndrome, as I coined it. Long ago I've come to the conclusion that the grass isn't greener on any other side. It's all relative, someone's green may be another's brown. Your green today may be your own brown tomorrow. But the grass surely IS different on the other side. And the addiction to finding out those differences, then to conquer them and get used to them, is so compelling it sometimes clouds all other judgment. It's an innate urge that's never easy to fight. At times you just want a simple, easy, happy life. Is that too much to ask? Of yourself, if nothing else?

Home is where the heart is. But when one isn't even sure where one's heart is, what does one use to gauge?

~bmthc~

~~~~~~~~~~

NOTE: An interesting side-effect that I've noticed, of all this leaping around, is that we all have funny "universal" Vietnamese accents. Ba has one that's predominantly Northern, and TM's is Southern. Understandably enough, since they both grew up in one area until adulthood. But even theirs are not your "typical" regional accents. While Mẹ's accent is a bit of a mix of everything, which to us, is really cute! m' and I can switch back and forth between Northern and Southern but I guess our Northern enunciation's gone a bit awry now.

Also I often find it amusing when people ask us whether we came from the North or the South. Sometimes they find it hard to guess just by hearing our voices. a/ When I can't be bothered I'd say South, since I sound Southern enough. b/ When I feel like being mean I'd say North, just to see the puzzled look on their face. And c/ when I want to be nice I'd tell the abridged version of the little novel above, just to waste people's time, and brain cells. A similar thing happened when I traveled overseas, i.e. outside of Aus and VN, when questioned where I'm from, it goes a/ VN, b/ Aus, and c/ VN then Aus, according to the 3 moods above.

Previous experience suggests that I will make a grandiose list and will in fact barely scratch the surface, but I refuse to let that put me off. I quite fancy having a look at Triphiodorus, maybe even translating some, doing some work on accents, and reading more around Greek tragedy, in particular Vernant and Vidal-Naquet and Oliver Taplin's new book . We'll see how much of this actually happens...

I get this a lot. Despite having lived in the same town all my life, people often ask me if I'm - usually - Canadian or Australian. English people. It's so strange! Once or twice I've taken advantage of this and played along with it too.

This got me thinking: technically, I could manufacture my past, make myself out to be someone I'm not. In fact, my past could be made up. Who can prove it? There are early parts of my life that I'm not so sure I remember, as opposed to having created them based on what I've been told and photos I've seen. My earliest 'memories' are entirely in third-person, for instance.

I don't mean all this in a sinister, conspiratorial manner, it's just a weird thought. I guess the cliché moral behind it all that the present is all you can be sure of. (...Or is it? Dun dun duuun!)

Now I have to train him to say nappy, pram, geezer, aright mate, oi!, cheers love, how's your father and mum will defintely be the word.

I do believe that language influences music. I strongly believe that the rhythm of a language defines the rhythm of that culture's music. Each language has its own rhythm. This is what makes each culture's music sound unique.

Certainly, the environment comes into play. A culture's physical environment influences the types of musical instruments that a culture builds.

I'm not sure if language determines how a culture tunes its instruments. For example, the Indian culture tunes their string instruments, for example, a sitar, into microtones. A microtone is a note between two notes. For example, on a piano there are the notes C and C-sharp (C#). When tuning a sitar, there may be one, two, ten, and so on notes between C and C-sharp.

There may be a relationship between language and tuning systems. I'll need to do some research. Certainly, please share your thoughts with me.

The rhythm of a language helps me understand my students. I teach students from many countries. When a new student arrives, sometimes it is difficult for me to understand what he or she says. I listen to their accent as I would listen to music. Once I understand the rhythm, I understand them.

Music, language, tuning systems, rhythm, to me, they are fascinating. I've played keyboard instruments my whole life. Is melody the international language? I don't think so. I think rhythm is the international language. I'll talk about that in a future post.

A lot of singers lose their accents when they sing. You'd never know Paul McCartney or Mick Jagger were Brits until they stop singing and start talking. The lead singer of one of my favorite bands (Jackyl) has a Southern accent that actually gets worse when he sings (sangs, in his parlance). The singer for Buckcherry has a crazy Southern drawl.

Some singers enunciate so poorly that I have to wonder how their record ever got cut without a producer screaming at them. Leona Lewis comes to mind ... "Sumpin' happened for the very first time wit you .." "I'm in love wit you"

But not me! I do not have an accent! They train broadcasters to sound like me - a perfect blend of all the dialects in the country. It's why they call it the Midwest - because we're in the middle.

I speak English. I do not make up words or butcher the language. I know better. My parents taught me better (even if MoC occasionally puts an inappropriate R in the word washcloth. But only that word. Not Washington or anything else with the word ‘wash' in it. Weird). And I only referred to Missouri's Boot Hill because that's what one of my teachers called it and I was 7 so I didn't look it up at the time and it stuck in my head forever. Therefore it is impossible that I have any kind of accent at all, much less a southern twang.

Until I rewatched this video*. In my defense, I was putting this on a bit to make it funnier (I don't say "ain't" and I, like, hardly ever say "like"), but ... the accent is there.

"The evidence before the court is incontrovertible; there's no need for the jury to retire."**

* The set up for the video is here

**Name that tune

When I lived in North Carolina I was often met with people who would think I wasn't from the South.  One time, when I lived in Asheville, these Northerners came into the store I worked in and asked me in kinda hushed tones "What are you doing down here?"  So, I know I don't have a heavy Southern (American) accent, although I can do a mean one if I put my mind to it.  And there are a few words I sometimes say like a New Yorker for some reason, especially the word dog, but I'd never have thought I sounded Canadian.  I'm thinking maybe I sound Canadian because of the alterations I've started to make to my pronunciation just so people here can understand me.  Just slight changes in vowel sounds, longer "a's" and different intonations and rhythm.  Some of it I am aware of and do on purpose because my attempts to say things otherwise have been met with repeated requests to repeat myself.  And I was speaking what I thought was English, really - I was.  So, what I'm now wondering is ... is the Canadian accent just a combination of a Southern American accent and a British accent?

Some of the changes to how I speak are not on purpose, they're just happening, especially the rhythm and intonation alterations.  And the degree these things change depends on who I am with and how broad their accent is.  Its kinda like I'm a verbal chameleon changing to best communicate within my surroundings.  Or to use another analogy, its like when you have two violins, and if a string is played on one of them, it will cause the string of that same pitch on the other violin to vibrate weakly (called resonance or sympathetic vibration).  I'm not trying to speak with a British accent because I've never been able to do accents, but I just find myself speaking differently than I'm used to.  Sometimes I think I might be going too far with this, because today a man asked me "Is that Irish I hear?" 

** Have a listen to the Canadian accents at The Audio Archive a page of audio clips of English speakers from around the world reading aloud.

Also relevant is this fascinating episode of the Canadian Broadcasting Centre (CBC ) radio one show And Sometimes Y entitled "Getting an Accent" that discusses how people take classes to change their accents and why people change their accents depending on who's around.  The show compares Canadian and American accents.  You can also hear American children gradually aquiring a British accent after moving to England.  They also discuss why people cling to their regional accents as a source of pride, and why the Queen herself has changed her accent!

Most of us know what White Valley Girl/Uptalk is. For those of you who don't, it's when, like, a girl, talks kinda like this?? And she's, like, not exactly too confident in herself?? Total exaggeration, but whatevs. The pattern/dialect/whatever you want to call it has been made fun of in movies like Clueless and the TV show, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air (Hilary is totallllly an Uptalker!). So yes, demographically (from a socio-economic POV), the Uptalker and HK Mallrat are the same.

The sad part is that both styles are common in women over university age. And some girls just don't know how or when to turn it off. I think it's kind of okay if you talk like that with friends, but at work? I don't think so. Sure, most Uptalkers turn off their "likes" but the Uptalk continues. Don't these women worry that they sound like they're in their early 20s or even younger? Especially if they look young? How on earth can they be taken seriously? Many people already assume that a young looking person is the intern, not the full time, fully paid employee. I thought most young looking people in their twenties and thirties didn't want to be treated like a kid?

I honestly don't know which one is more annoying. A 30 year old (or older) talking like she's a child is just as dumb as a 30 year old saying "like" and "whatever." In both cases, she can attract the wrong type of partner.  In both cases, it's difficult for her to move up, career-wise.