Babel Bi Bo Bu

I missed my posting date! Anyways…

I read an article today about Asians not getting the right medical attention and other basic services due to their inability to speak English. According to the article there are about 14M Asian-Americans. Thirty percent (30%) of them (or 4.2M) are foreign born therefore it’s not surprising they can’t speak much (if at all) English.

According to the same article,

“One Asian had his wrong leg amputated while another was thrown in jail for not taking her medication — all because of limited English proficiency in the United States.”

1 in 14M, or in 4.2M even, is not statistically relevant. It may in fact be sensationalizing real stories to become news worthy. But I guess highlighting tragedy is easily one of the best ways to attract attention.

We are lucky that even though our education is in serious decline (only UP and Ateneo made it to an international survey, although critics dispute the findings), Filipinos are still able to converse in everyday English. Its something that we have, and should continue to have and hone. That is why we have call centers mushrooming here.

Other Asians though still have difficulty speaking in English. Even if they do speak the language, they have a very strong local accent – examples are Indians and Orientals. Locally, we also have regional accents. Similar to Lululu.

This differences in languages brings to my mind the Biblical story of the Tower of Babel.

According to the Bible, The Tower of Babel was built so high it could touch the heavens. The tower was built with ease and laborers didn’t lose a leg to amputation because everyone spoke the same language. The tower was built for the glory of man, which pissed off the Man Upstairs. So in all His might and glory, He confused man’s language and man scattered across the earth to go forth , multiply, and not blogger.

Maybe there’s truth to that Biblical story. I know for a fact that there are similar words found in different languages. So there was probably one single language during the Oogabooga times (i.e. Neanderthals).  I am not an etymologist so I probably should stop here.

According to the same article -

Asian Americans are also the most “linguistically isolated” racial groups in the United States, studies show.

When disaggregated, the percentages are even greater among Southeast Asian groups — 45 percent of Vietnamese Americans, 31.8 percent of Cambodian and Laotian Americans, and 35.1 percent of Hmong Americans were linguistically isolated.

For us Filipinos, maybe we’re just isolated thus having free reign to convert American pop songs into local novelty songs.

@#$@#% (I didn't understand them either)