My Grey World » flexible tongue

flexible tongue

Believe me I really did research to write this blogpost. Usually a blogpost won’t require a research but apparently I did a research.
Not that I want to make this blogpost “cool” by having many links to different reference websites. Because I just need a good reference to address the topic well. (euh I sound like making an important essay or something)
ANd I should spend the time researching for one blogpost to do a research about my topic for my ELW.

Okay what I want to talk about is the so-called flexibility of my tongue. Oh and my research successfully failed because instead of finding a term to define this, I got bunch of articles about programming languages. (freaks me out) I tried to search “flexible tongue”, then “flexible tongue language”, then “flexible tongue language human”, then “adaptability to new language”, and so on. It will cost me one full blogpost to really list them all.

I also tried Yahoo! Answers. But the only decent answer was “linguist” which certainly is not the case. Or a polyglot. No no, that’s not what I mean.

What I mean by “flexible tongue” (we should agree to use this term since I’ve got no term to describe that. Oh wait. Did I just coin a new term?) is that the (extreme) adaptability to a new language.
Like what happened to me. I somehow have this weird “intelligence” (dunno a word to describe it) to learn a new language fastly, or to make it fresher as it just happened, to adapt a new accent/dialect fastly. (Read : Singlish)

I’ve only lived in Singapore for two months and have (extremely) adapted to Singlish. It’s such a shock for me everyday for hearing me saying things like
“Lidat can or not?” Can it be like that?
“Can lah, why cannot?” Of course it can be done, why not?
“You want to go where?” Where do you want to go?
“Can meh?” Are you sure it can really be done?

Well well well. Look at that. What a short way to say a long sentence.. And be understood rather than using the “good” one. Nah, ignore it. Just a feature of Singlish.

My friend said that it’s not a weird thing because it also occurs to many Indonesians, who everyday speak to Singaporeans. But the thing is, the Indonesians he was referring to have been in Singapore for at least 3 years.
Please explain to me the reason why I can speak nearly like them in only 2 months.

If that’s not enough, please tell me why I can speak Balinese accent in just 3 days of staying there.

It always depends on whom I talk to. If the person speaks “good” English which I actually don’t know the parameter is, I can speak like that. If the person talking to me in Singlish, I will reply in Singlish (especially after I understand the different structure they have from the proper English). Or in case in home my auntie talks to me in Chinese of Hakka dialect, I will also reply in Hakka.

That’s the curious case. Why the hell can I be like that? It’s all about switching (though I experience some lingo-confusion -don’t try to google this word because I just made it up-) and switching. But still.. I feel.. Awkward. Especially hearing myself speaking that dialect (I think I should consider it as a dialect). Unexpectedly. Unintentionally.
Freaks me out. Just so you know.

I can accept the fact that my Indonesian friend who has stayed in Singapore for 7 years if not more has developed Singlish.
But how about me?

And know I don’t even know whether I should consider it as a should-be-rejoiced thing or an awkward-and-annoying thing.

Oh, if someone finds the term for that flexible tongue thingy, tell me okay..

Till we meet again. (ugh?)