We are born speaking different languages and it is natural for us to speak our mother tongue; however, English is the lingua franca among all rendering us compelled to learn it to find jobs, emigrate or communicate. Learning English becomes a universal value but not merely a course to study and we have many people scramble to learn it with insane hard work as proof.

I am a Chinese born in Hong Kong, I started learning English when I was very small with my schooling in kindergarten and I found I like it. Nevertheless, when I later entered into the real world working, I found the application of English I have learned was far from what I needed in the real world. I found I was even unable to communicate with foreigners in my working place, I struggled every day to talk to them only to find I seemed not to know English rendering me every day embarrassed, scared, and frustrated. Not until I found out the truth gradually did I know what happened then. The following is what I have discovered.

Native speakers speak English without consciously or unconsciously making accommodations for non-native speakers, they speak at their own pace, speed, and accents without being aware of acting a good communicator, not to mention a good adaptor. They think English is the lingua franca that everyone has to learn and it is the task they must accomplish themselves without them making effort to accommodate. They are too proud and happy of being the breed of people who are born speaking English and see it as their innate privilege failing to know languages are communication tools rather than a power-related tool to subjugate people.

Native speakers have to restore humility to admit that they are just lucky to be born speaking a language that is universal and come to help others to speak it. Only when doing so will this language sustain the longest with the best usage. They have to know when they talk to non-native speakers without making accommodations to make them feel embarrassed or look stupid, they are not communicating but destroying their language. The thing is, there are four times more non-native speakers than native speakers in the world population, if native speakers insist on not making accommodations when talking to non-native speakers, they are the ones who fail to communicate rendering their language useless.

The main thing for us to be together and work wonders doesn’t rely on the skills of the language we speak but the empathy, affection, love, and adaption we are willing to give when talking and communicating. The more of these things we give, the better the communication and relationships we are in. It is both the responsibility of native speakers and non-native speakers to build that bridge to communicate or they will all fall into the river below where there may have sharks waiting for them.