The W-Problem and Others

How difficult is it to learn a language? According to an ancient Chinese proverb – there are ancient Chinese proverbs for everything – learning a second language is like acquiring a new soul. Since the tender age of five, I have devoted my life to acquiring the new soul as I have tried to learn how to read, write, and speak English. After all these years, I can state without any doubt that the wise men of ancient China were really wise. Speaking English is difficult, and it gets more difficult by the day.

Learning English is practical, more so now than it was 40 years ago. In this age of globalization, English is undoubtedly the foremost language of worldwide communication. No wonder that English-medium schools have sprung up all over the world. Even district towns in Bangladesh these days have one or two schools where English is touted as the medium of instruction. Practicalities aside, the Bengalis from either side of the Padma are also rather proud of their English. Wasn’t there a time when ‘he speaks English well’ used to be the ultimate praise for an educated Bengali?

I have lived in the United States since 1996. Prior to that I had lived in England for a year. Coming from a privileged educational background, I had gathered the basics of spoken English in Bangladesh. The year spent in England, I used to believe, had added the necessary polish to my English. Coming to America, I was supremely confident and proud of my mastery of the language. My new friends and my teachers at the university all understood me perfectly. There were no problems. And why should there be a problem? In addition to my educational background, my native language Bangla had prepared me in a unique way for tough-to-pronounce words. The Bangla alphabet in its abbreviated form has 11 vowels and 32 consonants; there are three whole letters in it just to represent S, and three more for the different shades of T. I could pronounce every English word and some more.

Only now I realize that I had mistaken the politeness of my friends, teachers, and the man on the street as a sign of how well I spoke the language. Now I know (hopefully) the extent of my difficulties with spoken English. I just cannot manage it when any of the three vowels – E, I, and U – appears right after the first letter of the word, a consonant, and is followed by R. To me, ‘firm’ and ‘farm’ have the same pronunciations. There are also pairs like ‘age’ and ‘edge’ with surprisingly similar rings to my ears! Also, when to (or not to) elongate the vowel at the end of a syllable? Is it mono~poly or monopoly? The most serious case, however, arises when W is the first letter of a word. To me, ‘Wood’ is OOD. I have tried hard, without much success, to resolve my problems. I even saw a linguist once.

When confronted with the W-problem, as I have come to refer to it, I try my best to pronounce the word correctly the very first time. However, I often fail, and after multiple unsuccessful attempts, I go to my fallback strategy – using examples such as ‘wood as in furniture’. A fellow Bangladeshi who also shares the W-problem has found what I believe is a more direct and effective solution. He used to live on a street with the name like – Pine Woods Boulevard. When giving his address over the phone, he would say Pine, then spell ‘Woods’, and then say Boulevard. Spelling a word with a leading W is a better alternative to trying to speak the word.

Interestingly, despite our difficulties in communicating with the native English speaking population, we never have a problem communicating in English among ourselves. The observation raises the question about how our English appears to the native English speaker. Do we sound like the opposite of the adventurous Englishman who has learned to speak Bangla? My worst nightmare is being the counterpart of the 19th Century Bangla speaking English Sahib (as portrayed in old Bangla movies).

I have often thought about why I had considered my English to be so good 20 years ago and why I find it so very problem-ridden now. I knew very little of the language 20 years ago, and I did not know of my problems. Over time, I have learned a little more English, and that has led to a realization of the problem. It is almost like the case of the village barber who also practiced surgery; without the knowledge of the human body, he was free of any apprehension regarding his role as a doctor.

As we spend more time in an English speaking country, we speak more English. More practice, however, does not necessarily lead to a better brand of English. It is just that we speak more of the language in our unique way. Unfortunately, after using the language at work, at the supermarket, or when haggling over the price of cable-TV on the phone, English also becomes the dominant language at our homes. The presence of children adds a new dimension to the equation. The children learn their own English at school, and unless the parents take an active interest in teaching them Bangla, they grow up with English. As a result, for the lazy parents, the majority of us, it is perhaps easier to communicate with the children in English. However, I am really not convinced that using English gives us any advantage with the children. If you think about it, what are our options? We could use Bangla, the language the children barely understand, or we could use (our) English, the language they barely understand.

As we adopt English as the primary language of communication at work and home, we are led to believing that English, rather than Bangla, comes to us more naturally. Some of us are actually emboldened enough to take our English speaking skills to other territories. Although I fully support the premise that an individual should be allowed to choose the medium and the language of his expression, the said freedom perhaps should not be widened to include public-speaking at social get-togethers. I am sure that there are hundreds of thousands of expatriate Bangladeshis all over the United States of America who have suffered silently through the speeches of the very confident English speaking members of their communities. As a part of the long suffering silent majority, I am, however, sometimes a little conflicted. Should we attribute our sufferings entirely to the English language? Would the speeches be any better in Bangla?

An inflated sense of his command over English of an individual can sometimes create wonderful comic relief for others. At a social get-together of expatriate Bangladeshis somewhere in the United States, the individual with the microphone in hand announced that dinner was ready. He also urged the ladies to go first (to the dinner table). His exact words, however, were – ‘ladies beheaded’. Of course he was not proposing a mass decapitation of the entire female audience. He was only stating, in his very own English, that the ladies should be heading to the dinner table. Just like the surgical knife in the hands of the village barber, the English language at our disposal can have deadly consequences!

The life of the Bangladeshi expatriate

The 9 to 5 job holding middle aged Bangladeshi expatriate in the United States (please see note) visits Bangladesh once every two to three years. The visits usually last for 14 to 21 days, and generally take place during the summer months to coincide with school and university closings in the United States. The primary purpose of these visits is to meet the immediate family – parents and siblings; meeting old friends in Bangladesh is also an important but secondary purpose.

In recent years, the trips to Bangladesh have been serving an additional purpose – to obtain a Bangladesh National ID card, or to expedite the processing of dual citizenship documents or a machine-readable Bangladesh passport. The documents are necessary to facilitate a safe and potentially legal passage of inheritance money from Bangladesh to the United States. Although a majority of the Bangladeshi expatriates in the United States had originally come here with the goal of settling down in the land of the plenty, there was, perhaps, the flicker of a wish in the back of the mind to go back some time. As the expatriate has grown older and set increasingly deeper roots in his new homeland – moved into his own home, seen the children grow, leave home, and start their own families – the wish to go back has gradually faded. Making arrangements for the inheritance money perhaps is the final confirmation that there is no going back. This is the last stop of the journey.

Almost everyone comes back from Bangladesh with a happy face and a similar set of stories to tell. Conversation topics generally revolve around – Food was excellent – Traffic jams and Corruption, once the two problems are addressed, the country would go a long way – Dhaka has grown so much, you can hardly recognize it – and, Oh, people have got money, loads of it.

The joy from the trip, however, is short lived. In a week or two, the expatriate is back to the routines of the predictable old life – the chores of work, the often mundane conversations at the weekly get-togethers with other expatriates, and the occasional expression of commiseration to friends and acquaintances on the deaths of their near ones.

The first generation immigrant from Bangladesh is essentially an outsider in the United States. He did not grow up here, and he does not have the knowledge of the intricacies of the broader culture of his adopted homeland. He also does not have the time, the energy, or the desire to integrate with the larger society. Although he has lived in this country longer than the span of his life in Bangladesh, he remains firmly committed to the culture of the land he had left decades ago. The expatriate Bangladeshi lives physically in the United States, but the wonderful culture of his adopted homeland that has been shaped by generations of immigrants from the four corners of the world essentially escapes him.

The life lived as a social outsider can be painful. An important manifestation of the life in a cultural cocoon is the marked detachment of the expatriate from the lives of the children who grew up in this country. Although the children remain loving and respectful, they mostly hide the Americans in them, revealing only aspects of their lives with which their parents feel comfortable.

The saddest aspect of the life of the expatriate, however, is the realization that he is an outsider in Bangladesh as well. The land where he was born, went to school, made friends, fell in love for the first time, and had dreams of greatness – he does not have any meaningful connection to that land of his ancestors. He also does not have any chance of developing any meaningful connections during his short visits to Bangladesh. The trips are essentially guided tours – he is chauffeured to people and places – he is always accompanied by a friend or a relative – he does not engage in conversations with the locals – he is scared of the people and the place.

It was not like this before. The trips to Bangladesh used to be magical. The middle aged expatriate was once a young man, and he would be in a state of excitement for months preparing for the trip to Bangladesh. He would go back home with a newly minted degree, with the assurance of a new job, to show off the newborn - a brand new citizen of the United States. With suitcases bursting with gifts, his journey would begin from New York, Chicago, Washington D.C., or Houston. The cramped airplanes and the crowded airports would all be ignored – they were bringing him closer to home. The euphoria would set in when the pilot announced that the plane was in Bangladesh air space. The joy of landing at the Dhaka airport or the wild feeling in the heart when he would spot the first familiar face among the waiting throng was simply priceless.

The pure joy is gone, partially replaced with apprehension. Age does that to all. Also the fact that his connection to Bangladesh was essentially through the people he knew. Some of them have left Bangladesh. His parents, if still alive, are old and frail. His siblings and friends in Bangladesh have their own priorities. They give him time but the connections to the place that came easily to the young man are lost.

The expatriate Bangladeshi now understands the pain of the immigrants who had helped build this great nation. Driven by hunger, famine, persecution, and the desire to build new lives, millions of people from all over the world had come to the United States before him. Most of the early immigrants, however, could never go back to the land of their ancestors as they never had the necessary resources. Also, the persecution and the hunger that had originally driven them out were still there. They had no choice but to live in the United States.

The Bangladeshi expatriate apparently does have the choice of going back. Unlike the early immigrants, he is not constrained by a lack of resources or looming persecution back home. However, he rarely goes back. Leaving the predictable and safe life in the United States is too much of a sacrifice. He also loses the comfort of knowing that his children are only a short plane ride away. Healthcare considerations are another factor. Also, what is he going to do in Bangladesh? Who will help him with everyday chores? How is he going to shape his social life after a gap of two to three decades? Also, most of his old friends are now in the United States. His siblings, if still in Bangladesh, are busy with their own lives. And he has lost completely the street-smarts one needs to survive in Bangladesh. He cannot go back. It is not practical.

The expatriate Bangladeshi does not really have a choice regarding where he wants to spend the coming years of his life. He will stay in the United States. He will grow old here. If lucky, he will be independent, healthy, and will have his immediate family with him until the final days. His only real choice, it seems, is about where he wants his final resting place to be.

A Prairie Home Companion, a long-running National Public Radio (NPR) show is named after a cemetery in Minnesota. The cemetery serves the Norwegian community and was built almost 100 years after Norwegian immigrants started settling in the upper Midwest. According to Garrison Kailor, the creator of the show, it took the Norwegians almost 100 years to realize that there was no going back. How long would it take the Bangladeshis?

Note: Bangladeshi or Bangalee? We have been Bangalees for hundreds of years and we’ll remain so until the end of time. The political identity of Bangladeshi, in contrast, was first used only about four decades ago. However, following the current social practice, I refer to expatriates from Bangladesh as Bangladeshis.

My Reasons

I have decided to write and share my observations on topics and issues that are of interest to me. I’d like to make it a recurring event, perhaps once or twice every two weeks. However, before I take the plunge, it is important for me to provide an explanation of my motivations. After all, it is eminently possible that only a few people, if any, would read any of my posts.

I grew up in Dhaka, Bangladesh in the 1980s. We moved from Chittagong to Dhaka in 1979. Unlike my new peers – the children of educated middle class families in Dhaka – I did not get to watch television regularly because we did not have a television. We also did not have a cassette player, the ubiquitous music player of the 1980s. We did have a radio, and we had books – many, many books.

My father had his collection befitting the professor of literature he was. My elder brother, however, was by far the more prolific collector of books in the family. Although a student at that time, he frequently bought books using whatever little money he had. At the height of it, he once purchased between two and three hundred books from a book store that was about to go out of business.

An additional source of books in our house was the gift from the authors to my father. Although such gifts arrived the year-round, the numbers literally exploded during the month of February. I remember carrying loads of books from the car almost every day as my father came home from office. Some of those books were from established authors while some were from brand new writers – the first effort of the very young poet or the autobiography of a retired civil servant or of an insurance executive. I was especially intrigued about these autobiographies. Most of these authors had no known records of achievement in the public sphere. Some of these books were well-written with references to important people while some of the other autobiographies were at best awkward descriptions of rather average lives. In my middle teens to the early 20s, I wanted to know why those people had spent their time and money publishing books that perhaps nobody would ever buy or even worse, read.

Thirty years down the road, I know the answer. The authors had believed that they had something to say and they said it. They did not care if anybody ever read it. Thirty years down the road, I find myself in a very similar situation. I just turned 50. Although not yet retired, I seem to have developed the desire of the middle class, retired Bengali gentleman – to say something.

This is my explanation for writing my observations. I’ll, however, try to save my reader (if any) as much as I can. I’ll not write about mundane events that took place thirty years ago involving people nobody has any idea about. My writings would instead revolve around topics and issues that I believe are relevant today.