:: punched, drunk and loved ::

Dienstag, August 30, 2005

pardon the MIA-ness.

i had my first gem (the geisha module. i dropped econs.) today. we have a tutor who is really a phD student. he is from germany and he can't speak english very well. in fact, he sounds too halting and harsh and terribly nervous and blushes profusely when he is in front of the class.

now if u are one of his students - of coz u'll automatically think, "wahlau! lauzee tutor!". or at least, this is what i gathered from the majority population's reaction to a "foreign" tutor who can't speak their language. we feel that we can't communicate our ideas to them very well, and thus will be penalised for that.

as we were the last grp to present our proposal to him, he was obviously drained from listening to other grps and couldn't process what we said very fast. (trust me, listening to a language u aren't familiar with is hard work) when we concluded, i thanked him in german and immediately, he excitedly launched into "Sprichst du Deutsch?!?!?!" and a whole torrent of conversation that followed. and it seemed that once it started it nv stopped.

my other grp member was very amused we kept at it for so long and she thought i was very pro. but what she didn't realie was that, actually i could only understand maybe abt 50% of what he said in his muttersprache, the rest is guesswork and fill-in-the-blanks. while he took twice as long as a normal person wud to process my english sentences.

having a series of funny communication breakdowns and being dummmified in meine Deutsch Unterricht this sem, i can totally understand how he must have felt. it's a, "finally! someone can speak my language/ can understand me!!!" and u must binge-talk to make up for the shortfalls.

the tutor/me definitely appeared to have a different personality when he/i can use his/my muttersprache. very bubbly and spontaneous. while the other is very slow and cautious, and very worried about commiting grammatic or vocab mistakes. and it shows.

ok. actually i forgot what was the moral that i'd wanted to impart. something abt not getting too worried when u get a foreigner tutor. (i know many who do.) i am very tired. but u guys/ girls are very smart pple so u can figure out what i mean.

it was |2:30:00 AM|