I can walk english. i can talk english.

ya ya ya!! one of the advantages of being "convent" educated means that u r gonna be fleunt in english. forget the yes man, no man talk. but overall u have an edge over others.....or so u r made to think. i mean see any matrimonial ads, the description goes: wanted bride for US educated and settled boy, v.fair, 22-25 yrs, convent educated........ so on and so forth. (actually i can write aan entire blog on matrimony ads too) So u see the importance of convent educated!!
in my family my mom, brother and I are convent educated. so except for my father (who though has studied in vernacular medium is still more fleunt than us in english) we all belong to the so called fad fad english group. post marriage though my hubby is from english medium school i still make fun of the way pronounces some words coz he isnt convent educated.
now why am i writing about knowing english???? coz recently i bumped into someone who i thought for sure must be knowing english and so i treid to converse in english, only to realise that this person didnt understand a word of what i had said.
so that brings me to this................. is it really necessary to know english???
well, if u want to survive in this cut throat world of competition, then u must know english. but should it be at the cost of ur own mother tongue????
countries like japan and china have prospered without majority of their population knowing english. havent they felt the need to make english compulsary in their schools??
when we were in school we would be punished if we talked in any language other than english during school hours. we could talk in marathi and hindi only during those lectures. else we were compared to the ulti palti (read municipalty) schools. but sometimes i do feel that we have lost on a rich culture which our language "marathi" has. till sometime ago i used to be proud to say that i dont know a single marathi song, nor can i read and write marathi fluently (though i hv studied the language for a good 10 years). but then sometimes i feel bad of the fact that i hvnt read some of the greatest works in marathi literature bcoz i get too bored trying to read marathi.
i would scoff at people who werent fluent in english. consider this, i used to try and correct an uncle's(not my relative) english speaking skills when i was just 10 years old. he would take it in good spirit!!! i was taught in school that people who didnt english are all low class, down market!! and so when i went to college it was a complete shock to me!! being convent educated was considered a handicap here. somehow all the friends i made in college were either from my school or from some other convent. others (who were in majority) ignored us coz they thght we were too snooty.
even my most important criteria while getting married was that the boy should be fluent in english. hehehehe!!
when i was teaching, i always told my students, that to get ahead in life u should be fluent in english. while taking a job nobody asks if u about ur mother tongue. (except if u r going to teach and that too be a language teacher)
my thinking changed drastically after i visited japan. i saw how developed they r, even without having known english for sooooo long.
so did i scoff at the japanese?? nopes. did i think they were down market?? nopes.
thats when i realised that here in india our minds have been conditioned to think that english nahin toh kuch bhi nahin.
dats y even amitabh bacchan says" i can walk english, i can talk english" to prove that he is superior to another guy.

HULLLOOO PEOPLESSSSSSSSSSS

hmmm a long break again b4 i finally get to my blog. but then so much has been happening of lately that i really dint get enough time to come and visit my blog.

btw summer's here and with that there has also been a change in place of residence. yep..... am in the city of joy now. IIM C actually. nice, quiet and peaceful. but at the same time a bit too far away from the city. nyways getting used to place now, or rather getting a hang of it. will keep updating about anything new that does happen.