Today I met a girl when I attended my computer class. I had some questions about the homework, so I asked the girl who happened to sit beside me. The very moment she began to speak, I was totally astonished. She was speaking English! How could this be possible?! She is not in every respect like a foreigner; on the contrary, she is just as ordinary as any Chinese girl that you may not even notice while in the street. Confuses arouse in my mind. “Maybe she’s from a country close to China like Vietnam or Laos?” I guess. Excited about meeting someone from a country which I have never been, I changed my language and asked her in English merrily:

“Are you a foreigner?”

“No.” She replied.

“Then…then why are you speaking English?” I opened my eyes and mouth wide.

She laughed, “Because I joined an English activity, and today is my turn to speak English for the whole day.”

“Wow, that’s wonderful,” I couldn’t hold back my curiosity, “What kind of activity? Will everyone in the team strictly obey the rule, speaking English the whole day?”

She explained to me that it was an English program outside the class and was organized by people outside our school. To Obey the rule or not was , of course, decided by oneself as no one would be able to check it, after all. Whereas, this girl I met obeyed it very well and was brave enough. When I ask her would she be ashamed when people noticed her different speaking, she smiled yes and said “but you have to get used to it”.

A girl like me of little words unexpectedly felt like talking this afternoon. I sought chances to talk to her during the whole class. There were things we didn’t know how to say, but there was an excitement of exploring, too. It seems that English, as an unacquainted language to me, is more vivid because it’s like we are describing things for the first time when speaking, so there exist many possibilities of how we describe them to be found. On the other hand, Chinese seems a little bit too familiar to me. (though I haven’t acquired all the details of it, and I think it is also an excellent language.) As a result, I am sometimes tired of saying a word. But when writing, I prefer Chinese as it is easier to keep up with my flowing thinking. And I like the wonderfully beautiful rhetoric in Chinese essays.

You know what, I prefer using English when I am murmuring. I feel the mysteriousness in English. Just like in the famous movie Avatar, when a NA’VI(纳美人) say “I see you”, they are not simply saying I see you with my eyes, but that I see into you, I can feel you. How wonderful it is! Man’s deep thoughts can never be totally conveyed in words, conversely in the movie they are delivered in the most simple words but unexpectedly illustrate the vast landscape in one’s mind. When murmuring in English, I feel like wandering leisurely in my thoughts.

Isn’t it a bit “崇洋媚外”? Actually I don’t mean I prefer the foreign culture to our Chinese culture. It’s just because my affection and maybe gift for learning a language and new culture. You know, some people don’t like languages, like my roommates. They can’t hate English more!