I know Little bit Tamil
This is an issue which has been nagging me for years which I am finally happy that I am being given a chance to express it.
The issue that I want to highlight is the use of our mother tongue, Tamil or Malayalam or Telugu for that matter. I understand that although we are all categorized as Indians in this country but in our own way we are of many different types of clans and thus we have different types of language we practice. What I don’t understand is that since when English became our mother tongue? Did our great-grandparents have illicit affairs with the Mat Sallehs who were in Malaysia before our independence? Is that why we have so many dark skinned vellekaren walking amongst us?
Honestly I am sick and tired of listening to Indians who keeps SPEAKING broken English to their kids at temples, dhevarem classes and bharathanatyam classes.Seriously what the hell? Come on, these people are coming there to enhance the Indian tradition but are ashamed to speak their own mother tongue? If we don’t practice our mother tongue then who is going to speak it? Chinese? Or better still Americans?
The other day I was at the temple going about my business when I heard something which made me rooted to the spot I was standing and turn around. I saw this lady (might be in the age group of 40+ ) who was explaining to her niece of 6 or 7 years old bout Mother Durga. The only thing which made me pissed was not her explanation but the language she used. For God’s sake that lady who should obviously know Tamil (since when Indians in the olden days were fluent in English? So her parents definitely would have communicated with her in Tamil,shoot me if she can’t speak Tamil cause I can and I am way younger than her) was explaining to the girl or more likely introducing her to Goddess Durgama in English. How corny. What a shame for the Indian community that an introduction between a deity and her young devotee is done in English. Oh and did I mention that she did it in Tanglish which is the broken English that most Indians are so proud of parading around?
I can even digest that but what I can’t really digest is the new trend going around this days, yenneku Tamil theriyathu especially very popular amongst the TAMIL GIRLS!!! Seriously what is so damning about the Tamil language? Why is it that our youths can’t speak Tamil? Frankly I am not a pure Tamil either. I am a mix of Tamil and Malayalee but I am proud to say that I am Tamilian. I am not from Tamil school. I can’t read Tamil. I was from private school where most of the time we practice English. Still I am fluent in speaking Tamil. Why? Because of my parents. My father always I won’t say that the fault all these youths parading around saying they can’t speak Tamil are theirs but actually it’s their parents’ fault. Yes their parents pretended to be kononnya ‘higher class’ by refusing to practice their own mother tongue to their children thus now the children also are doing the same thing. So who is at fault here? The parents or the youths?
If their skin is a bit fair and if they are working in any office, then these people love to pretend that their ‘upper class’. God save me from these people because I really feel like puking on their faces. Earth to people of this mentality, well-educated Indians practice good Tamil at home not the other way around. What is the biggest shame is that I know a boy in my college who the father is a HEADMASTER FOR A TAMIL SCHOOL and he can’t speak Tamil! What type of a teacher is he? He can’t educate his own son on his mother tongue, how is he going to educate the children of others? Another friend of mine whose both parents are Tamil school teachers but their children can’t speak a word of Tamil,pathetic lots.
The same goes for other native tongues as well. Malayalam, Telugu, Hindi and Punjabi. If we don’t practice our mother tongue who will? I mean let’s take the Chinese for example, when a group of them join together, they tend to speak Cantonese or Mandarin or Hokkien (which are their native tongues) or the Malays. When the Malays gather bout they will be talking in Malay. They all seem to speak their mother tongue when they are together but not the Indians. Oh no no no, our Indians are way too ‘high class’ for poor old Tamil, Malayalam and Telugu. They are all the siblings of Americans. They only practice English albeit a broken one which sounds like ‘sitting under the murunge maram eating sambar satham’.
They would rather embarrass themselves with those commands in English rather than to speak beautiful Tamil. We also have another category who loves to pretend that they can’t speak Tamil. Um how may I ask that these people communicate with the older generations such as their grandparents? Maybe they sent their grandparents to English tuition perhaps? OK I can hear all sorts of uproar saying that how are we going to improve our English? PAUSE…! Let me ask a question. How are you going to clean your neighbor’s mess when your house is in a mess? It’s the same concept. How dare you teach your child a foreign language before he or she masters their own language? Is Tamil so hard to master? I didn’t think so. Remember the first word out of a child’s mouth is amma not mummy. Please master your own language first before you take up on others’.
Fun info to all those English loving Indians who don’t know the pride behind Tamil language is that:
1. Tamil is one of the classical language in India due to the fact that it has not been influenced by Sanskrit
2. It is known as an antique language due to its literature predating any other modern Indian languages etc Tolkappiyam which came around 200BC
3. Tamil is first Dravidian language which was predominant in the south India which gave way to the evolving of Telugu and Malayalam.
I hope that after reading this at least most Indians would be proud of their mother tongue. Thank you.
A Tamilian who can’t stand through anymore broken English,
Durai says : “Who said Tamil girls don’t speaking Tamil? Look at the beautiful words used below.”