If you want to know the truth, I’ve hit a low in my Malayalam studies. I’ve mentioned before that Malayalam is a hard language to learn –but what really hit it home was my inability to read Kerala in Malayalam last week. Kerala, the birthplace of my parents. Kerala, the place whose language I’ve come to study. Kerala, the most commonly written word I see around here.
In trying to show-off my newly acquired Malayalam skills (or non-skills, as I sometimes think), I tried to read the title of an important document in front of an important person I was interviewing for my research on organic farming (this was also an attempt to convince him to give me the Malayalam version of the document in addition to the English one). Instead of reading “Kerala,” I read “Kola.”
In my defense, the three letters that spell “Ko” are very similar to the three that spell “Kera.” In fact, the third character is merely flipped around.
In any case, I felt like a fool when I realized this mistake on my own, a few hours later! If only Malayalam — the language of my family, heritage, and PhD research — could come to me more easily!
(Luckily, or unluckily for me, I’ve been told that such dismal feelings are common in any language immersion program, particularly around the half-way point. I’m looking forward to my midterm break this week.)
hang in there!
Yes, don’t get too discouraged! I’m think that language immersion programmes, while they’re very effective, also give you a slightly exaggerated sense of the “normal” rate of progress (both because they ARE quite good and because you’re surrounded by native speakers, and you want to catch up). I’m sure you’re doing fine.
It’s a slightly embarrassing mistake, but it sounds like a very easy one to make.
It takes real guts to do what you’re doing – learning a new language by plunging into the middle of a different country and culture, and doing tough PhD work in the middle of it. Good luck, keep going, but please don’t beat yourself up about how far you’ve come.
Miss you, love you.
Much thanks for the kind words and support.