A Powerful Tool

Language has never been my forte. I have had a mental block when it comes to studying a language. The three languages I can claim to know are English, Malayalam and Tamil. However I can never claim to be a master of either three. By virtue of having studied in the English medium, I can to some extend say that my English is passable. I envy people who have a flair for a language and can talk so well and put across their thoughts in such a clear fashion. Latest in the long list of such personalities I admire is the President of the United States of America Barack Obama. People may have different views of his politics; but they will all have to agree that among the present inhabitants of planet earth, he ranks among the top ten speakers in the English Language. How I wish I belonged to his breed!! As for Malayalam, it is my mother tongue and hence am able to speak and make myself understood reasonably well. Malayalam literature goes way above my head and when I am in a Malayalam literary forum, I could as well be in Patagonia in the Amazon forest. Having resided in Tamilnadu/Chennai for more than three decades, I can speak Tamil reasonably well; however as for Literature, it shares the same status as Malayalam.

My second language in school was Hindi. But my abilities to express myself in Hindi are appalling. Leaving Hindi behind, I decided to take up French while in college. Apart from helping me to score some marks in the exam, French has worked no magic in me. (Some of my friends who did the same three years of French in college are French tutors now). They say languages are learnt when we hear them being spoken. If this is true, I should have picked up Arabic as I stayed in the Middle East for almost 18 years. All this has brought me to the conclusion that I have no aptitude when it comes to learning a language and pursuing this would be a total waste of time.

I had no choice when it came to learning the English language. Being the language to communicate, I had it in my psyche that it will stay with me forever. Nothing comes easy, and I have braved some embarrassing moments to get it right. Women’s Christian College, Madras, is an institution which has so many unwritten rules and traditions and believes in following it to the T. One such rule was that the whole class meaning the whole of Pre University Course irrespective of what major, or the whole of first year degree students or second year students would be divided in to four groups as far as English classes go. Being a college with a total strength of less than 500 students in 1970’s it was possible to do this. (I wondered then as to why the college administration went through such rigmarole). The science students always were at a loss when they were together with the English Literature students while studying General English. So each year when the test was conducted to segregate the class, my prayers would be that I should find a place in group B or C. As luck would have it, all the three years I landed as you would have rightly guessed in group A. Being in a class with girls majoring in Shakespeare and Shelly, and being taught by the best in the department, I would cringe each time I was made to read something I had written. My plan used to be to hide behind the person in front, but that never worked thanks to my physical disposition. Even now I remember vividly how I used to long for the bell to ring!! I suppose I had no choice but to endure those classes.

It is 32 years since I left college and 33 years since I last attended an English class. However on hindsight I think it must be those classes that made me strive to be accepted among my peers. Had I been in C or D, English too would have taken the same route as the other languages in my scheme of things. Much as I would love to be a Barack Obama, I am content that I have the ability to express myself in a manner understood by others and gladly appreciated by few.