Say something different.

(Originally posted on April 17, 2011) Patricia Ryan spoke in TED saying “Don’t insist on English!”

Ironically, it’s only said by an English-speaking teacher to attract more attention than many others who had said the same thing before her in other languages.

Of course, this is a cultural, economical and even a political thing that goes against the real voice by people who speak something else.

IMHO, the ability to speak another official language is not enough to be proud of. If you can speak a dialect in a different culture, that really means something: you skip the things that the officials want you to know, you overcome language and cultural barriers to understand some other people who have been ignored by the majority.

You’re really into something that can be called “exotic” in terms of intellectual and life.

I wish I could.