- Blog : Language, ugh. Language has always been a stumbling block for me. In the early years of my life, I was a quiet child far too quiet. While my peers started talking, I remained silent; there were no words like "Mama," just silence. At the hospital, they discovered I couldn't hear anything. I was smart enough to read body language, though, so I knew when to laugh or cry. They reconstructed my inner ears, and I had to learn to speak during the rest of my preschool and primary school years. The hospital and university monitored me over the years, using my case as a study subject. I struggled to pronounce many sounds like the letter 'r'—and even blowing out a candle was a huge effort. My Dutch language skills remained at a basic level; my mother is Australian and learned Dutch as a second language, while my father op has low literacy skills. In secondary school, I got good grades in everything except language subjects. Yet, my language difficulties didn't stop me from writing books or becoming a local councilor. In politics, I often wrote my own speeches using simpler language. I can understand and read English, but my pronunciation is terrible. I’ve been living in Spain since January; I started attending Spanish classes halfway through the academic year because I didn't have a car and my neighbor was already taking the course. And yes, Spanish is a nightmare for me, too. It took me over ten years to learn how to pronounce the Dutch 'r', and the Spanish 'r'—or the double 'r'—is completely different. Over the past few months, while school was closed, I studied really hard because I’m allowed to move up with the class to the A2 level. Classes start again on Monday, and I’m quite nervous about it. It really bothers me when I get my homework back covered in red-pen corrections. Still, the teacher is amazing even though she speaks Spanish and can not speak a lot of english and the class is a friendly group. And if I say something odd in Spanish again, luckily I can laugh about it. After all, I make strange mistakes in Dutch and English too, which sometimes leads to amusing situations.
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