I was browsing through the online learn Japanese for beginner site when my mak came into my room - browsing through my notebook filled with Japanese alphabets - only from 'a' to 'se' - and said, to quote "Baguslah belajar bahasa Jepun. Lepas ni belajar French dengan Spanish. Arab tu kena betulkan balik." Then it hit me - I love languages, though not good in many. Even my Malay and English grammar is still going haywire.
My father is quadruplingual (I honestly don't know if that word exist or not, hehehe). He's able to converse in Malay, English, Arab & Javanese. Most of my Chinese & Indian friends are trilingual and sometimes I just envy those who are able to speak more than 3 languages. Languages are beautiful. It is our most precious form of communication - even cavemen have their language. I spoke Malay ever since I could speak, I learned English from TV and school and I've learned Arabic since I was 8, which I say is a pity that I wasn't able to master it. I'm 100% Javanese but I only know very little of it. Another pity. I was able to converse in sign language when my housemate's sister stayed with us for quite a long time. She is deaf but the whole house occupants were able to learn the language from her because of her warm personality. Then again, when she moved out I forgot nearly all of it.
My all-time favourite English teacher would be Puan Norliah (though I bet most of my friends don't like her). She have her moments but to me, her class was never boring. Cikgu Zaiton a.k.a Mudirah would be my all-time favourite Arabic teacher. In from 3, I was put in the weakest set for Arab (I always get C at that time boardering to D) and she was the teacher. From the moment the class starts, everyone was put on alert when she wrote a word on the board and picked us at random to construct a sentence from it and put the word synonym and opposite word (in Arabic of course). It was quite tense for me because she would always remember my sister. My sister was a student in KTAM, '88 batch and she was the head-prefect during her time - a fact that I believe, I never told any of my schoolmates of.
The hard work paid off when I was able to construct easy sentences and I was able to compose a short essay in Arabic myself. When I was in Form 4, Ija and Rafidah, my fellow juniors/dorm-mates approached me after they did an interview with Cikgu Zaiton for their PMR history project. They said that when they asked the most memorable moment for her - she said, it was when I got A for my Arabic. They told me that she didn't expect that at all because of my previous results and that she was actually waiting for me to see my results at the middle of the 'kolong' from the office. When they said that, I suddenly remembered that she was laughing from the office door at my reaction. How can't I be touched? Though it all went out when I was in upper secondary. I wasn't able to keep up with my new Arabic teacher. Not his fault but I lack the motivation because Arab Tinggi is the literature part of Arabic. If it was communication Arabic, I think I would able to but I'd still say, a pity for me. Cikgu Zaiton retired when we were in Form 4. I miss her actually and would really want to meet her again someday - probably would be bringing my sister too.
Hmm... any possibilty of me being multi-lingual?
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