Why Do I Write in English
I began writing English blogs this July, and have written quite a few. Instead of getting tired of it, I found it a lot more fun, and made up my mind to write more in the future.
Apparently I know my limitation in expressing the English language properly. In fact I was frequently put in the uncomfortable positions when finding that even writing down a single word was demanding. I had once spent my whole day at a far-away Starbucks writing my English blog. Then posting the article on my blog, I was not surprised to receive several pertinent advices in both my poor vocabularies and dismal syntaxes.
Then, you might ask, why do you write blogs in English? Kind of weird, Uh? After all, English is not your first language! I do know that, and I know that for most people, Chinese is seen as sufficiently applicable. However after realising how essential English is nowadays and will be in the future, I changed my habits and went out of my comfort zone with delight.
My own story dated back to this summer when I went to the US and studied there — the first time in life when I was fully absorbed in a native English environment. At that time I met a Korean girl. She could not speak Chinese, and neither could I in Korean, but in English we communicated and became friends. I got impressed and realised that English was acting as a handy tool for better communications.
I took more classes in English, read more English textbooks and papers, and later this year, delighted to become an exchange student in Taiwan. Then I found how English was highly emphasised here; in fact I was at first so astonished to find my professors, though almost 50, speak such well-pronounced and fluent-spoken English. For professionals at such age in Taiwan, mastering English is common, but in Mainland China, it is just incredible.
During my stay in US and Taiwan, there is no Great Firewall(a.k.a. GFW). In fact I climbed the Wall using VPN tools when I was in China, but it was not until I went out of it that I realised how the Wall was disgusting. Maybe we will all be made to pay a price for it.
I am trying hard to be exposed to open internet environment and connect to the world. Instead of using Chinese, I get used to using English. I read English books and write English articles; I learn online courses and search my interests in Google and Wikipedia. And I am the person optimistic to believe that technology can change for a better life. Our time is changing; the digital age is coming. Everyday I use my iPhone reading English articles selected from Twitter and Medium in Pocket, listening to Udemy and TED talks on my way, and blending into all kinds of fantastic communities such as Pinterest, Airbnb and Jelly.
But above all and of most vital importance, I am thinking in English. Some people say that to master a language is to think in a different way, I agree because I had my experience learning another language German, when I felt at that time that my English was falling behind. Different languages use different ways to think, so the best way to learn English is getting used to thinking in English instead of my native language Chinese, which means, to read and listen in English, to look up new words in an English-English dictionary, and above all, to think in mind in English. That is why I write in English, and I hope that this article is just a beginning, when I am using more, I am using better.