Reverse Accent Shock

After living in the Philippines for three years and in Canada the year before that, I was shocked to hear the accent that people have in the place where I grew up. Canadians and Filipinos definitely have an accent, but I had always thought that the people in the area where I am from speak basically the standard English of this country, not because I was arrogant, but because I didn't hear the difference. After being gone for such a long time, I suddenly noticed some disturbing patterns, and even started to hear them coming out of my own mouth. Now I'm beginning to think that the accent in this area, and consequently my own accent, sounds horribly abominable, and find it hard to believe that I didn't hear it before. The following are some of the patterns that I've been noticing:

1. The word "to" is often pronounced "teh," the e being the schwa. One of these days I'll analysize exactly which to's becomes teh's, but the native speakers of English always know when to say "teh" and when to say "to." This is not necessarily a mispronunciation, but does sound funny when you're not used to it.

2. The word "just" is overused and ambiguous, and is almost always pronounced "j'st," at least in this part of the country. I'll let you try to figure out the meaning by yourself, but be warned that it can often be eliminated without changing the meaning of the statement that it is used in. In fact, I once heard some Filipinos picking on the Christian song that has the words, "I just want to praise you," because they understood "just" as a diminutive, as if praising God is a lowly thing. Of course, maybe the song is supposed to mean that the only thing that the singer wants to do is to praise God, but I'm sure that wouldn't last long because, pretty soon, the singer would also want to eat, sleep, poop, pee etc. A better rendition might simply be, "I want to praise you."

3. I often hear "um", which I formally thought was only used as a verbal pause in English, used as a substitute for "them." How did "them" become "um"?

4. The word "can" frequently becomes "c'n."

5. Of course, "going to" sometimes becomes "gonna," and "want to" sometimes becomes "wanna," and "got to" becomes either "got teh" or "godda."

6. Another phenomenon is the use of "'im" for "him." I need to listen more closely to see if this is common.

7. A few people say "-in" instead of "-ing," but not everyone is in the habit of dropping their g's, and it's not something that I've ever heard myself do.

Of course, there are probably other differences in pronunciation, and I don't want to talk about grammar.

When I was younger, I used to think it was cool to not talk properly, though fortunately I never know much slang. I did, though, have the unfortunate and confusing experience of being told out of the blue by some snobs that I took a few classes with that I really ought to talk better. I tried not to think too much of it at the time because I thought that if I were to talk better, I would sound uncool and starchy or that other people would simply think that I'm a foreigner. When I read Remotely Controlled by Aric Sigman, though, I began to see that the television has influenced us to think that it's cool to talk and act less educated than we are. Intelligent people in this country used to and often still do practice their pronunciation, spoken grammar, and vocabulary. This book went on to indicate that everyone must at some point decide between exuding coolness or intelligence, and pointed out that you will get much farther in life, such as in a job interview, if you speak, act, and look intelligent rather than cool, because in the real world, people do still judge your intelligence by the way you speak, look, and act (not to mention whether or not you can spell :-( ).

Because of that, I am left to quake and tremble every time I open my mouth. That abominable accent keeps coming out.

only a little room left for dessert? eat another double quarter pounder w/cheese instead

I saw a tiny piece of cake being sold individually. It was regular cake, not cheese cake, and had the deluxe sounding name Velvet Creme Cake with creme cheese frosting, though I doubt that it's much different from any other store-bought cake (yuck!). I looked on the bottom of the package, and was shocked to see that it had 580 calories and 29 grams of fat. I showed it to someone else, who said that it looks like about "three bites for a man." And indeed, it looks about the size of a piece of cake that I would take so that I could try some without overdoing it, or probably half the size of a typical piece, or a third the size for some people. (I won't mention any names, but you know who you are.)

Then today, I just saw a healthier alternative to the Velvet Creme Cake, an equally small piece of Carrot Cake with creme cheese icing. It has 720 calories and 40 grams of fat. If I were to buy the whole cake and cut it myself, an ordinary sized piece would probably have 1440 calories and 80 grams of fat. For those who want a big piece of cake, I would cut a piece with 2160 calories and 120 grams of fat. Never mind that your tiny sliver of cake would have only 20 calories and 2 grams of fat less than the McDonald's Double Quarter Pounder with cheese that left you too full for a normal sized piece of cake, or that a large piece of the same cake would have more calories and grams of fat than 5 regular Quarter Pounders.

I recently finished the book Mindless Eating by Brian Wansink, Ph.D., who figured out that if a person eats 100 calories per day more than he or she needs, which isn't enough to change a person's metabolism, that person will gain 10 pounds in 1 year. That means that if you were to eat an extremely healthy diet of only as many calories as you use every day, but allow the limited indulgence of about 1/6 of a sliver of Velvet Creme Cake every day, which is probably a small mouthful or half of a bite for a man, you would gain 10 pounds in one year. Otherwise, I suppose you could have one sliver of cake per week all at once and gain about 9 pounds per year. Or, if your healthy diet had one bite of cake every day, and you quit eating your cake for a year, you would loose 10 pounds. I didn't know that an ordinary piece of cake could be that rich.

Happy New Year!

It seems as if 2008 has been two or three years in one for my husband and myself. We began the year finishing a couple of classes, one of which (my class) had been extended far into the second semester because the teachers had been in Bangladesh and other places during most of the first semester. We were staying with some of the extended family in Bambang and traveling to Manila frequently for classes and for my husband's visa application. I was also suffering from a terrible allergy to smoke and pollution, which made me feel sick much of the time.

n April, we celebrated both our first anniversary on April 7, and our graduation on April 6. I graduated with my first Master’s degree, M.A. Applied Linguistics, and my husband got his second Master’s, M.A. Community Development.

Then in June, my husband had the wonderful opportunity of flying to Thailand to present a paper about preserving cultural heritage, especially the traditional music and musical instruments of the Kalanguya, with an SIL Ethnomusiclogist who works in the Philippines. We decided to make it our belated honeymoon/anniversary celebration, and flew over a few weeks early because of the expiration of my student visa and denial of my permanent resident visa.

After the first week in Thailand, we had some adventures traveling across the Thai border into the communist country of Cambodia to visit an American couple who had gone to school with us in Manila and are living in Phnom Penh, the capitol of Cambodia. After we took a bus to the Thai/Cambodia border, we crossed the border into Cambodia on foot only to be followed by a man for more than an hour who sent us to the “only” bus station and was trying to get us to pay an outrageous price to take a taxi to Phnom Penh. We ended up having to stay the night in a little guest house in the muddy border town in Cambodia where the water from the sink drained onto my toes when I tried to wash my hands. The landlady’s sons drove us on their motorcycles to the real bus station early the next morning.

Then in July, I had to be out of the Philippines before my husband's visa interview, which was scheduled for July 14, because the embassy would not issue a visa to him if I were still there at the time of his interview. I arrived home on July 7 after traveling for about twenty hours. It’s nice to be back with family and friends and to be in a place where I blend in and can easily find pants and shoes that fit etc. after being a foreigner for such a long time. I was amused, though, when a couple of fellow Americans asked me what nationality I am. I must have been gone a little too long….

I actually haven’t experienced much reverse culture shock other than noticing for the first time the rather strong accent used in this area. I guess I’ve spoken that way all my life and didn’t even notice it before.

A few days after arriving home, I learned that my husband's visa interview would be postponed because his medical, which he had a few days after I left, showed something on his lungs. It turned out to be TB that is resistant to one of the four TB antibiotics. He consequently had to move to Manila where he goes to the hospital every day to get his antibiotics. His treatment should be done by spring of 2009. His latest sputum test already shows improvement.

For now, I’m staying with my Dad (and Grandma lives in the basement) and am working full-time (4 am to 1 pm). I hope to save up a little money so that I can go back to school and so that Bob and I will be able to move away and rent our own place after her gets here. I also hope to find a job teaching somewhere so that I can use my degree. (If anyone knows of a place that is looking for ESL teachers anywhere in the US, I would definitely be interested). I haven’t been sick once yet since returning home, probably because I haven’t been around enough smoke, pollution, and second hand smoke to trigger my allergy.

I do have my own car now, which is a huge blessing. Dad sold me his car, which is a good, reliable one, for a much better price than I could have gotten one elsewhere (with the condition that I pay him the profit that I make when I sell it later), and he replaced it with a one-year old car that he also got for a very good price.

My husband just moved to a different place in Manila because of the late-night noise and second hand smoke that he had to put up with in the place he was staying. The new place isn’t close to the hospital, but has a cleaner, quieter environment. He is also starting to search for a job over there.

In December, he was also spared from a terrible accident. He was preparing to ride a jeepney (bus-like vehicle) to a wedding in one of the villages. In fact, someone was calling him to leave, but my husband delayed and ended up making them both miss the jeepney that they were supposed to ride on. As they were waiting for the next jeepney leaving for the wedding, he learned that the first jeepney had been in an accident and that 18 of the 25 people riding it had been injured, and some were in serious condition. He ended up going to the hospital and helping the injured passengers instead of going to the wedding. We’re thankful that God spared him and his companion from being on the jeepney that was in an accident.

May you all have a wonderful 2009!