Hey, you!!! . Ya la, you. Look here!! Pay attention when I talk to you! Don’t look here look there. Read my message to you’.
The sentences above sound familiar to you right? There are no mistakes, right? WRONG!!! There are mistakes. The most obvious mistake is ‘Pay attention when I am talking to you!!, this should be the correct sentences. There are also a few other common mistakes done by Malaysian students. Such as:
· ”Why you got out without asking my permission?”
· “Teacher, I want to see Koo Ceng”
· “Eh, you know or not, that next door Ah Sam, ah . She, ah, very busy body one, you know. She, ah…”
Yes, not all students make those mistakes during their writing tasks. These students can write very well without grammatical mistakes, with good sentence-structure and very deep vocabulary, but when it comes to oral English – gosh…, their standard of English is the same as Ah Sam’s English at the market – full of ‘You know, ah…’, ‘You see, ah…’ and others.
Students from different families and background have different standards of English. Some students are from English - speaking families, some from Malay-speaking families or Chinese-speaking families and so on. So, each student brings a different kind of ‘English’ to school. The Chinese bring ‘ah, ma, you know ah, I know…’, whereas the Malays bring ‘ha, ya, you don’t see, you donno, I donno…’. As for the Indians, they bring in words like ‘yilek’ and ‘yingaporinge?’ They also bring the Indian slang into the language. This special kind of English is known world-wide with the name ‘Malaysian English’ or ‘Rojak English’.
It might not funny with those words alone, but what do you think if combining those words from the Rojak English into a few sentences? It will be like these:
“Aiyaa… Ah Kow. How do you do?. I, ya? Ooo… very best. Now I work what, ah? I, ya, now is a very cheap planter only. Eh, you got woman already or not? Yilek? Haiya,… why you drag so long? You not young already you know. Go out there, go shock a girl. Bring back home see your parents. Then, da,da,da,dada,da,da,dada,,,(Wedding march). So easy, like eating ‘kacang putih’.
So, what do you think about these words now? Just imagine when we speak to a foreigner, especially an American or European, whose mother tongue is English. Dare to say that, they will be shocked with our ‘English’ or they will laugh until tears trickle down their faces. My dear readers, let’s work together to improve our English and stop making our country well-known for its poor English. Instead make our country proud of us because of our good English. Let people from all over the world know Malaysia for its clever citizens in mastering various languages.
*Let the French say: “Ah, tez Malaysians, They are so remarkable.
Good Engglizz speak. Unlike other cuntriezz.
-C’est abominable!!”
(English- “Ah, these Malaysians. They are very good in English. Unlike other countries- nonsense only!!”)
*Let the Japanese say: “Hait, Marasyans. Good Engrish! Good people. Nonsense-no! Engrish- very
perfect. People many friendly.
*Let the European say: “Wow, these Malaysians can really speak good English. We’ve gotta put a good
relationship with ‘em.
*Let the Arabian say: “Malaseia, alhamdulillah…”
(All the phrases will only be appreciated if it is read with the correct slangs)
So, no matter what the world says, we, as Malaysian, should increase our efforts in promoting the right usage of English, and not allowing it to deteriorate to form of street language; like in Singapore where English has become ‘Singlish’.
p/s : aku mmg tak copy kat mane2.. mmg ade dkat blog aku melalui pelajar sekolah aku yg lepas yang menghantar karya dia dkat aku utk dimuatkan dalam majalah! , so
..no credits.
