(By Uzoamaka Doris Aniunoh) - Two things I'm interested in discussing today:
language and accent.
I am guilty of some problems I want to point out, but
I'll talk about them regardless.
So back in Birmingham, I dated a Spanish man who was
Spanish in every sense of it. Like, his English was Spanish English. His accent
was Spanish. His style of cooking was Spanish. He had absolutely no problems
telling me he didn't know the meaning of a very basic English word. He would
use a translator to find the meaning of the word in Spanish and only then would
he know what it actually means and the context it was used.
I liked his accent and even found his not-so-vast
knowledge of basic English, cute.
Now, when I served in Abeokuta, it was different. I
dated a Yoruba guy whose English was kinda like that of four year old, and I
had no atom of patience for his nonsense.
Would it be because Nigeria is an English speaking
country, and considering that the latter was my colleague at work, I expected
more from him? Did I tolerate my Spanish man because, well, Spain is a Spanish
speaking country? Or was there something else?
