Using English just because... WHY NOT?!

Hello ladies and gentlemen, in this occasion I wanna give my opinion why people should let the others try to use English on daily life though they're not British, and so do they. I'll use English in this post, but if it needs to be emphasized, I'll just use Bahasa Indonesia instead. Bilingual is okay hwhw.

Why do I wanna discuss this? Actually there is no special reasons, but I just think I have to do this. I mean, while trying to improve our own capability in using English, we also have to let others to learn as well. Trust me, learning English and trying to use it, both in daily life and academic life, don't mean that we do not love our country, don't mean that we do not have sense of nationalism, please don't be narrow minded, darling. By learning English, and able to use it properly and correctly, shows the world that our country also has the potential to compete in this globalization era, that our country ain't left behind, that our country consists of awesome millenial generations.

But, the thing is, why do some of Indonesian often say,

"Sok-sok-an pake Bahasa Inggris, sok bule banget sih lu?"

"Biar apa sih pake Bahasa Inggris? Biar dipuji?"

"Lo ga bisa pake Bahasa Indonesia ya? Gaya banget pake Bahasa Inggris."

and so on, and so on.

I mean like, hell-aw, what's so wrong with using English? Does it bother you? Does it hurt you? Do you lose something just because people try to use English, try to upgrade themselves? O dude, please, before spouting that such harsh comment, please rethink. As a friend of mine said, Wahananing Yosie, please ask your self, "Bagaimana kalau ternyata lisan kita bisa jadi menggagalkan niat baik seseorang?", what if our words avoid and thwart people from doing kindness and useful things, or even making improvisation for themselves. Somehow, words can be as sharp as sword, as cruel as killer.

Tolong diingat, tidak semua orang terlahir dengan kemampuan yang sudah di atas rata-rata, yang sudah mahir dalam berbagai hal. Masih banyak orang yang harus belajar lebih, hanya untuk menyamakan kemampuannya dengan kalian, atau bahkan hanya untuk mengurangi jarak ketimpangan dengan kemampuan kalian (contohnya aku). Banyak orang yang hanya punya modal “pengen” dan “mau” (kaya aku). Tolong jangan dihalangi, tolong jangan dihina, kalau bisa didukung, kalau bisa dibantu. Kasian kan kalau orang lain yang belum punya mental baja yang dikatain, yang baru mau mulai sudah dijatuhkan. Tolong ya, teman-teman. Banyak orang yang punya niat tapi takut untuk mencoba, takut untuk dicap ini dan itu. Kalau yang diomongin adalah seorang Evi Sanjaya, yang dikatai “sok bule”, “sok jago” itu Evi Sanjaya, maka aku ga masalah, udah kebal dan yaaaa membal.  If it were me, than I’ll just say, without trying to use English, people still judge and be judged. So, never mind.

Here, I also want to share my experience, how come I could fall in love with English. Remembering my childhood, I only knew number 1 up to 10, some of colours and some of animals. I was taught by a friend of my dad, since my dad and my mom only knew a little due to the low education (however, I am always happy and grateful that they always encourage me to learn more). When I was in elementary school, I got English as a subject at school since grade 4, where it was still limited. I was not that great at that time (till today, I am still lacking, tho). I ever got a voucher to take English course (I mean discount), but I didn't take it, yeah that time, economy was the main reason. Till I graduated from elementary school, I hadn't fallen for English yet and I ended up just so so, even for singing Twinkle-Twinkle Little Star, I couldn’t. My love for English started to grow when I was in junior high school, JHS 1 Wonosari, Gunungkidul. Firstly, I had no confidence at all to use English, too ashamed to show my English skill while my fellas already able to create good sentences. But, thankfully, my English teacher, Mrs.Ponikem who was my teacher back then, encouraged us a lot to use English. I love the way she taught us, I thought like it’s brilliant. Like for example, we had to do a story telling, or to do various role-plays, and so on. While for writing, we have to arrange kinda a short story about everything (sure depended on the curriculum) such as procedure text, description text, etc, so without realized it, we tried to use various vocabularies that we hadn’t known before. She also taught us in super fun way, so starting that time, my most favorite subject was no longer Mathematics, but English. And the most memorable sentence from my teacher that I still remember is, “Belajar Bahasa Inggris itu kaya bayi. Belajarnya ya dari membiasakan diri mendengar, terus latian bicara, salah dulu ga apa-apa, belajar pede ngomong. Setelah itu baru belajar cara nulis dan baca”. It was so true, because, though we expertise in writing English yet don’t have any bravery and confidence in speaking, then our ability will be stuck at some points. Sure, teacher took part on how we learn, on how we enjoy the learning, on willingness to learn. That’s why, through this, I send my gratitude and prayers to all my teachers, especially my English teachers. Yah, it’s such a fortunate for me that got accepted in bilingual class that give me more chances to use English more often. Yeah, that’s how my love for English grew.

Nonetheless, I aint expert in English yet, I mean like, I was still mistaken to pronounce “now” and “know” in my last grade in SHS and knew to pronounce “stomach” and “stomachache” correctly when I was a college student. It was a bit shameful, but still, if I didn’t make any mistakes, I would never know the right ones. That’s the way of learning. “Jangan pernah takut belajar dan salah” sounds cliche, but it's still so relatable.

Another truth you have to know is, English opens up the door of hundreds opportunities. I mean like, there are lots of essay competitions that the main condition is “written in English”, so once you have plenty vocabulary, know the correct grammar and turn it into sentences, I guarantee that your easy is already half-done. I experienced it myself, found my self in confusion, lack of vocabulary that I only use basic word (just like this) without any paraphrases in essay, make my essay looked like an elementary pupil’s work. I felt at lost (ever since I entered college, where I rarely use English but when in JHS or SHS, I was pushed to use English at least once or twice a week). Other than that, if you have a super big dream just like me, to study abroad, or to travel the world, or to marry a foreigner hehehehe, English is absolutely needed. Don’t deny just accept it that one of the condition we have to fulfilled to study abroad is passing the IELTS or TOEFL or TOEIC. The sad fact is, my IELTS score was still around 5 (so embarrassing but true). So people, especially who often asked me why I so fond of using English rather than Bahasa (for my posts in my blog, for instance), the answer is none but the sorrowful fact that I was still lack in English.

Ah ya, next post, I’ll post some of information about IELTS I got from IELTS preparation held by At America. InsyaAllah. And for this post, sorry for writing is so randomly. I wrote this at my office (internship mode: on), stealing time. Hehehehehe.

To sum up everything, let’s learn English and let others do as well.

I love you. Xx.

-fv-