March 2010 Express Yourself
2010 年 3 月 1 日 月曜日I have a Canadian friend who has lived in Japan for more than 10 years now.
When I first met him, he couldn’t speak any Japanese at all.
His Japanese is now very good and for some reason he usually speaks to me in Japanese!
I actually find this kind of weird… I think of English and Japanese and any other language as just tools for communicating, so you should use whatever tool is best for the situation. In my opinion, if two native English speakers are speaking, then English is the best tool.
So recently I decided to ask my Canadian friend why he always talks to me in Japanese instead of English.
I thought maybe he just wanted to practice his Japanese – in which case, I would be happy to practice my Japanese too. But do you know what he answered?
He told me that he feels he can best express himself using Japanese.
At first I thought this was strange, but then I thought about my Japanese friends and my students, and I realized that there is often a difference in the way many of them express themselves when they are speaking English.
I wonder if they find that they can be more direct or more honest or more relaxed when they are speaking English?
What’s your experience? Do you find it easier to say some things in English rather than Japanese?
Tell me, “How do you best express yourself?”
