Language is a strange and untamed beast.
I found an article that I really need for my research. But it was in French. I opened it and started panicking. I need this article! But it’s in French! The text is incomprehensible! What shall I do?
And then I remembered. I read perfectly well in French. I’m completely fluent. And the moment I remembered that, the text changed in front of my eyes. All of a sudden, I wasn’t seeing confusing clusters of letters but meaningful and interesting sentences.
I’ve had this experience, but verbally. First time I’d ever been out of the country, had been in VN for a little under a week, but my ears were adjusting to the new default. And we were out in the countryside, small town, seriously the only roundeyes for miles and miles. I’m not good at the language but I was trying really hard. I was standing on a sidewalk, waiting for my friend who was doing some important bribery to get our papers in order, and this guy walks out of the nearby doorway, and greets me. And I could not for the life of me tell what language he was speaking. It was a string of syllables I could make no sense of at all. His face was a puzzle too. Who is this person? Why has he approached? Where on *earth* could he be from? And what the hell language is he speaking and why does he seem to think I’ll understand it?? But there was something kind of familiar… time stretched out like taffy, and I finally realized he was talking to me *in English*. Not English with a Viet accent like I’d been hearing for days, but an honest-to-gosh American accent… just not one I was very familiar with. Dude was a half-Viet, half-creole fellow from southern Louisiana, in town to visit his wife’s family.
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This is a very good example of a dolphin exercise. It’s not enough to see something: you need to watch.
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I didn’t see the connection but yes, absolutely. I let my inner noise overwhelm reality.
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A conservative literary critic and college professor
Clarissa's Blog 
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