Growing up in Nepal has provided me with a unique opportunity to learn languages. I grew up as a native speaker of Nepali however it didn’t take me long to realize I could speak another language as fluently as Nepali. I was in fourth grade when a number of students from India came over to my school in an exchange program. They knew very little of Nepali, which compelled most of the students in the class to communicate with them in Hindi. It was quiet awkward at first to speak Hindi not because I didn’t know the language but because of the similarity between the two languages. There are various words that can be interchanged - For e.g. in Nepali tea is chya and in Hindi it is chai. Within the span of few months I was able to speak Hindi fluently.
My first language learning experience was learning how to speak English. As a kid, studying in private school in Nepal, we were taught the basics of English. I knew how to read and write, however, speaking was something that was completely different. One of the biggest challenges I faced while speaking was the differences in pronunciation. Nepal and the United States had very little in common in terms of how people pronounced words. Even the basic words such as hour, geometry, salad, etc are pronounced differently. On top of the differences, it was already hard enough to form sentences and carry out a normal conversation. Factors such as these contributed to my first experience as a language learner.
As I spent more time in the United States I became more comfortable in speaking. The fact that I was talking mostly to American people helped me immensely in the sense that I could learn from the way they spoke. I realized the best way to learn speaking is to listen others speak and try to pay close attention to phrasing of the sentences, use of vocabulary, pronunciation and hand gestures. Soon, I became more confident in speaking however, till today whenever I have to say something I find myself thinking about it in Nepali, and later translating that in English. Although this has helped me become a better speaker, it has also slowed my response time.
Despite being an Ok speaker, I consider myself a student of English all the time. Every day I yearn to learn something new – a new vocabulary, phrase, pronunciation, etc. After speaking English for almost 5 year, I believe the only way to improve your speaking ability is to speak more and try to leave behind the feeling on not being a native speaker. In order to become proficient in speaking, I have to start communicating more and take confidence from my improvements and express the confidence while I am speaking.
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