Alexis’ Story by Twinkle - Deep Boroughs
Alexis
0:00:00
I'm British born, so I'll be British, but my heritage, as in my ancestral heritage, one level up is Caribbean Dominican, so I would say Afro-Caribbean, British, which is a bit of a mouthful, but it identifies everything that I'm linked to. So, yeah, and it's important to keep your links in your mind. So, yeah.
Twinkle
0:00:31
So how many languages did you speak while growing up?
Alexis
0:00:35
So the languages that mix are French, English, Creole, because Creole is a mixture of all languages, of people, different settlers in the Caribbean, so sometimes it was Spanish, and there's a bit of Spanish in there. There was the Indigenous people and there are other languages that date back to centuries of the Indigenous people's language. And there's also African descent, so the direct words from African language, which is mixed into this Creole and the French. So it's a bit of this and a bit of that, but we get round with... Generally I understand them. And they kind of understand the Creole, but some words don't make sense to them and I understand why they don't understand it, because there are some words in there that are not just thrown in from some other language, or a settler who settled in the Caribbean. So, yeah, so that's the sort of the background. So East London, the language in East London, well, I mean, our family moved, as I said, so majority 90% from Dominica, two born in the UK, but they only spoke the Queen's English, apart from one person. Everyone spoke the Queen's English, proper English, you know, quite well spoken. And just one family member has a bit more of a Cockney slang, she's a younger one, but no one really sort of like adopted this sort of thing, because in Caribbean culture, speaking proper English is the way forward. No one is interested in speaking slang. They don't identify with it per se or are interested in something that is not going to progress them. It's just how Caribbean people are. They're very good at English and very good at maths in the Caribbean. So their standard of English and maths is actually technically higher than the UK in all the experiences that have been proven. Like O-levels are much higher standard and and maths, I think they start with a times table. They know all their times table, like 12 times table, by the time they're about five. In the Caribbean, they teach the times table first, and so that they can become naturally, have maths in their head. So it's that type of thing. So, in terms of language, not really, I don't think I really adopted real slang as such. I'm just thinking there's possibly some odd words here and there that, you know, say for a joke or I understand where the slang comes from or I understand it, but I may not use it.
Twinkle
0:03:29
You said like one of your sisters know a bit of Cockney, so do you recollect any words that you are familiar with, any Cockney languages or phrases that were used in Cockney language?
Alexis
0:03:40
Um, well, she says certain things that just sound so funny. So, I, she said something recently and it's just funny. She just says bredrin, like this word called bredrin, which makes me laugh, it's almost, it means like a friend, like a brother, like a, I think it's actually comes from the English, it's actually probably an English definition of it, but I don't know if it's spelt like brethren, but it's basically like a family member. I bet you any money it's on the, it's a proper English word, but she says it, but they say it in slang, as sort of like slang for friends like brotherhood, womanhood, bredrin is like someone who's like a friend, friend something. So they use it but in a way that's different so they will say it as a joke to if you say something to someone and they don't like what you say they will say to you, like, are you joking? So the word brethren references are you joking? It's like a saying. It's like friend, are you joking? So it would be like saying "bredrin." It means like, "are you joking?" It's the same thing as are you joking?
Twinkle
0:05:02
Does she still use it?
Alexis
0:05:03
Yeah, she uses it. But she uses it for certain circumstances. It's not something that's used every day, but it can be used for sarcastic, being like, somebody says something you don't like and it's like, are you joking? So they'll just say, bredrin. It doesn't mean it's like, are you joking? Like, you're a joker type of thing. So I find that really funny, because when she says it, it just makes me really laugh. But I must admit, I don't even pronounce it properly, so I don't think I'd be good at saying bredrin to anyone. But yeah, that's a slang that somebody in my family uses. One person who speaks a Cockney style, but the only person in the family who speaks like that, no one else does. But you know what's happened with the Caribbean culture is that the Caribbean people like to, when they're in England, they like to adopt the English style, so they spoke mainly English at home. They never spoke Creole to the children. They spoke Creole to each other but not to the children. So you brought up very like English in a way. But you knew your culture because they were speaking to each other in the house. But they spoke to you in English.
Twinkle
0:06:13
But did you understand what they said?
Alexis
0:06:14
I understand what they said because it's been said, it was being talked about. Creole has been talked throughout my life. But they never spoke to me in it. So I could always understand it.
Twinkle
0:06:23
But you can't speak it?
Alexis
0:06:24
I can speak it but it sounds funny because it's with an English accent. I can speak it but it sounds funny because it's with an English accent. But they didn't actually speak to me in the Creole, they spoke English to me.
All audio transcripts (13)
Des’ Story by Althea - Badu Digital Hub
Althea
0:00:00
Can you tell us some funny sayings, because I know the Caribbeans have some really good sayings. I'll tell you one that my Dad said, and you can follow on and give me some more. "Never hang your hat where you can't reach it."
Des
0:00:11
Exactly. And it's when, mate, if you can't reach it, why would you hang it there? But, again, or, "the patient man likes to ride the donkey." And well, if he's patient, why is he riding a donkey? But as you get older, you realise this saying and another one, don't, the broom sweeps every corner, but the old one doesn't know. And, well that's scratching your head like, but my mum's favourite was, we would speak a language called Patois, which is broken French, and she would say to me, go and attend the gas under the fire. So she would give me half English and half Patois, and I used to just, it was hilarious. So, yeah, I could be a detective in this story. So, yeah, I could be sat here telling you stories.
Althea
0:00:53
Yeah.
Ismael’s Story by Rozina - Newham Community Project
Ismael
0:00:00
Growing up, I spoke Bengali, that's my mother tongue. When I came to the UK, the only place where I could speak Bengali is at home with my family members. Even then, not all the family members could actually speak Bengali because the first and second generation immigrants, the second generation especially, those who immigrated, they seemed to understand Bengali better, but those who were born here in the UK, they kind of lost touch with the Bengali language. Although they could speak Bengali to an extent with their parents, they were not too keen on speaking it. So I felt like I was able to speak my mother tongue fluently with the older generation, but when it came to the new generation who were born in the UK, they would prefer English, and I found it very, very challenging to communicate with them.
0:01:05
And I felt like I had to learn English rather quickly, because it's not only a question of me being able to communicate, it's also a question of prestige.
Jemima’s Story by Twinkle - Deep Boroughs
Jemima
0:00:00
Because Cameroon is a French colony, they speak French and English. But it depends which side or what your parents prefer. You see what I mean? So my parents were on the French side. We know we are different, We cannot speak a language like the way they want it to be spoken in French. - In France? - Yeah, in France. You know when you are foreign, even though you are not a little child, if you don't know, the language, things become really difficuly. You won't understand, no comprehensive. You can't be embed in the country. - The confidence is not there to approach people. - Yeah, in your community. You don't know what is going on. I remember one time, because of my pronunciation, I said, they assessed me for housing, yeah, and I said in the face of my interviewer, said, what are you doing with all this money? I can see, I said, I'm doing laundry. It was maybe my bad pronunciation. She put it like I say lottery. And my case was like put apart because my money I'm using it for lottery. And I'm not saying lottery, I say laundry. So another person have to come and check why I'm still waiting What is going on took all the thing so we went like a second interview going through Going through and the man say, oh bah off. They put here like attention sign. She's playing lottery, so why are we going to help her?
Twinkle
0:02:17
Oh my God.
Jemima
0:02:18
And I say no. The man have to say no. How do you want somebody that speak Cameroon, French, and I start English to pronounce laundry. And from that day I really pronounce laundry, it will come like any other word in my mouth. So it depends who is in front of you when you are doing such things. And I think that those who are foreign, language, when they do things, bring people from their country to help to translate. They really need a translator. Don't assume that, oh, she said this, she said that, oh, she understood what I was saying. Bring a translator for them.
Lara’s Story by Alexis - Deep Boroughs
Lara
0:00:00
Growing up, my mum didn't actually teach us Yoruba at all. Because she felt that when she came to this country, she wanted to fit in. And so she didn't want to basically be speaking another language. So it was just basically she wanted to speak English. And I think even when my sister came over when she was older, she just basically told her to speak English and that's it. So we weren't taught Yoruba at all.
Alexis
0:00:23
Okay. Do you understand it at all or do you not know anything?
Lara
0:00:28
So it was only when I got older and I really wanted to know more about where I was from, but not just that as well. I just really had an interest in Nigeria and I'd always refer to myself as, you know, when people say, where are you from, always, I'm from Nigeria. I've always said that from, you know, from when I was younger.
Alexis
0:00:50
Even though you were born here?
Lara
0:00:51
Even though I was born here, yeah. Because I would say in our house, it was very sort of, you know, our culture and our food, you know, was Nigerian, but obviously outside it was, you know, very English. And so, yeah, I always basically wanted to find out where I was from. So I ended up, you know, teaching myself how to speak Yoruba and you know, whether it's my friends or you know, my circle and just basically seeking out who I was and that's basically where I learnt. My Yoruba's not so fluent but I can understand and speak certain words even though people... - Can you actually understand it now? - Yeah, I can understand it. I wouldn't say fluently but I can understand a lot more than I ever did when I was younger. And so, yeah. So I grew up in a very diverse borough, which I'm so happy about. I had friends from all over the world, basically. So it's almost like I would say my, growing up, I had a big melting pot of different influences. And it wasn't even a case of being aware of, oh, your maybe, patois for instance, might be something that people might have been saying, because it's mixed into English, you wouldn't realise it's because it's just basically how people are speaking, so it's almost like people are speaking like that, and you just end up saying certain things, like the word black man, or kind of like ting, or whatever it may be you just end up because it's something that people are saying, your friends are saying so it's almost like you pick it up anyway and so the whole Cockney influence as well I code switch a lot so when I'm very comfortable with my friends I may very, my English language gets very Cockney and very, I would say would it be Patois I would say a little bit as well?
Alexis
0:02:51
Patois is a combination of three languages together.
Lara
0:02:54
Yeah, in terms of...
Alexis
0:02:55
Patois is quite interesting because it depends on what country you're in, but the Patois is, as in three languages, Patois, French for three. - Yeah, oh, I see. - So that's where it came from.
Lara
0:03:07
So it's a lot of that in terms of my friends, because one of my closest friends, she's Jamaican, but she's born here like me, so we kind of have this thing where we talk freely and it's almost like we express ourselves and I might drop some Yoruba in there as well when I'm talking now, so as I get older, I find that I speak into Yoruba, I might have that accent that I put on, but that's, like I said, code switching on how I feel comfortable, who I feel comfortable with. So with my friends, I speak freely, whereas with now I'm speaking now, that's another, you know, it's normal, but it's how I speak in a different setting. So there's different settings I code switch, and that's just normal to me. Pree, pree means why are you watching me. Is it? Like P-R-E-Y? Pree is another thing. You know when people say you're preen my status? That means you're watching my... preen is a Jamaican term.
0:03:56
Oh, is it?
Lara
0:03:57
Yeah, they say it in Jamaica a lot. So preen is another thing. I think ginnel is something that is a term that I think definitely is from Jamaica. - Is it for somebody who's, what does it mean?- Ginnel is like, she's undercover, she's shady, she's not real. - So how would you use that in a sentence? - So like that person is pretending with you. So she's a ginnel. Like she's not.
Alexis
0:04:26
So if you don't trust someone.
Lara
0:04:28
Yeah, like it's like...
Alexis
0:04:29
Who would you say it to, so you'd say to your friends,
Alexis
0:04:31
that person's a ginnel.
Lara
0:04:33
Yeah, she's a ginnel, so that's a Jamaican term, that's not... Then with Yoruba, I would actually go into speaking Yoruba, or Japa is another one that they say when you travel, it's broken.
Alexis
0:04:47
So how would you say that?
Lara
0:04:48
So, so, so, some might say, oh, she's gone to Japa, or he's gone to Japa. Japa means travel.
Alexis
0:04:56
He's gone to travel somewhere.
Lara
0:04:57
Yeah, Japa. J-A-P-A is Japa.
Alexis
0:04:59
When you add on the place,
Lara
0:05:01
you would say, if you're speaking about someone's gone to travel, they've gone to, like, say for instance, somebody has now gone from Nigeria, and they've travelled. Somebody's gone from the UK, and they've travelled to abroad. That's what Japa is.
Alexis
0:05:14
It's just like, just goes abroad.
Lara
0:05:16
Yeah. But there's loads of other different terms that I might say, but it's very difficult to say it now because it's like we're having a conversation it's like...
Alexis
0:05:28
It doesn't sort of feel right.
Lara
0:05:30
Yeah, and I wouldn't say it in this accent either. No, you'd say it in your English.
Alexis
0:05:34
In your code switching accent.
Lara
0:05:36
Yeah, in my code switch.
Lucy’s Story by Annabella - Solo Researcher
Lucy
0:00:00
There are more Eastern European people than there were. So when you walk around Victoria Park, you can hear about 20 different languages, which is so interesting. And I hear a lot of people speaking Polish and Romanian. And there also seem to be quite a lot of French and Spanish and Italian families here as well. - Yes. - And also quite a lot of Bangladeshi families who also speak Italian because they came to England via Italy. Excellent.
Annabella
0:00:34
Well, I am actually Italian, half Italian, and yeah, I did actually notice in a white chapel market these Bangladeshi young men, and they had a proper Italian accent. It was so weird. Yeah. Yeah. Small world.
Marcus’ Story by Alexis - Deep Boroughs
Marcus
0:00:00
So Newham's always been somewhere where, yeah, it's always been somewhere where I'd associate where my family is, because there's a lot of Ugandans. Sometimes I'll be walking down the street, I see a Black person talking on the phone, then I can like hear my mother tongue, my home language, I can hear them speaking it. And I think only in Newham that can happen, because since I've lived in North East London, more so Walthamstow and South London and I couldn't have that happen anywhere outside Newham.
Alexis
0:00:28
Oh right, Walthamstow, I know Walthamstow. So I know the central, Walthamstow Central and the schools were around there. There's the Greer Hurley Family Green School. I said the Green School, I don't even know the name.
Marcus
0:00:46
Walthamstow School for Girls.
Alexis
0:00:47
Yeah, that one. I don't know if they still wear the green uniform or not. - They still do. - And what was it, George Monarch's a bit further up isn't it? - There you go, yeah. - Oh right, okay. So you're a real East then. For you to circulate in Walthamstow and East, it's like you're really into it.
Marcus
0:01:02
But the thing is though, I would define places like Waltham Forest as being North East, and even Wanstead when I was living there, because you know the East End stereotypes of the Cockney and the Geezer? "How you doing mate?" That type of stuff. The culture, at least for the young people, is slightly different. Because I feel like this is the East End. The stereotype of the East End, it's here. So I always had, I always had Luganda. That's the national language of Uganda, and I always had Rukiga as well. So that's my particular...
Alexis
0:01:44
What's that? How do you say it?
Marcus
0:01:45
Rukiga. - Rukiga.- Yeah. So that's for my particular tribe, where I'm from, in Uganda, which is basically in the west, where the mountains are. And so we're not like the dominant ethno... whatever you want to call it. - Ethnic group. - So that was always around in the house, but I kind of, after my mom passed away when I was young, I kind of didn't really speak it as much. So I was mostly speaking English, but when you're speaking about slang and whatnot, I think I'm of that like generation of, I guess the grime generation. So yo, wagwan, what's up, that type of stuff. Though I noticed that the slang, because I was living in Highams Park for my teenage, for my high school years, I noticed the slang there, it's more or less the same kind of London,
Marcus
0:02:33
don't get me wrong.
Marcus
0:02:34
It's a little bit different than East. Reason being, is we just didn't have the Cockney influence, whereas my partner, she's born and raised in Custom House, and she very much highlights the fact that it was super Cockney at one time in Custom House. So I noticed that when we're talking about strictly East London or North East London, there's actually subcategories within it, so it's all still pretty much, it's all related.
Alexis
0:03:07
So just picking up on the languages, this is really the interesting part of some of the points that we're interested in as well. So you've mentioned a couple of things. Do you have any other slangs that you, you know, slang words that you might have used when you was younger, which mean something? Like nowadays, you'd have to explain it to someone if you said it.
Marcus
0:03:32
That's interesting. Yeah, no, definitely. Like, like
Marcus
0:03:36
Like if I said
Marcus
0:03:38
something was cool if I said the word heavy a young person would be like "Hmm?", they'd understand what I mean, but they'd be like you're old - What because you said it's heavy. - Yeah, yeah, that's heavy like that's That's not in usage anymore because you know there's like a life cycle for slang so...
Alexis
0:04:00
Well, I don't know. I'm intrigued by it, actually. I'm intrigued by what your views are.
Marcus
0:04:06
Um, yeah, so heavy would be old. I used to use that. I remember...I remember there was some old East End slang that people would say, like, if someone was going to beat someone up, they'd say, I'd punch your lights out. And I haven't heard that in ages. So I remember people used to use that.
Alexis
0:04:27
Do you still say that? I think if you went to Custom House they might do that.
Marcus
0:04:30
That's what I'm saying.
Alexis
0:04:32
Custom House, you might hear that every day. Yeah.
Marcus
0:04:37
To use the word bait is to say that something is blindingly obvious or it's very conspicuous, it's very easy to see. So it's like, if I said that I'm a Black person, you would say, yeah, that's bait. That's baitly obvious.
Alexis
0:04:51
Oh, I see.
Alexis
0:04:52
Yeah.
Marcus
0:04:53
Or they would say that sometimes, in a particularly nuanced way, if you're a bit infamous and you've got like a little bit of heat to your reputation, someone would say that you're bait because you're the talk of the town and not necessarily, it can be good, it can be bad, but it just means that you're on everybody's lips, so you're bait now. So you're like a...
Alexis
0:05:18
It means obvious, is it?
Marcus
0:05:20
Yeah, so it's not just obvious, but in this nuance, it's like you're... It's like you're a bit over-represented now, you're a bit...
Alexis
0:05:31
So it can be bad as well? - Yes.
Alexis
0:05:32
So bait can be bad, but it can also be good.
Marcus
0:05:37
Yes. And then in terms of like, influence from my mother tongue, sometimes if you're to say, oh, can you get me that, can you get me my phone, or can you get me that thing, they'll say, can you get me that Kathing, K-A. So that's like, it's just an interjection, it doesn't even mean anything, it just like, adds a little bit of flavor to what you're saying. So that, from a point of view...
Alexis
0:06:06
It adds an extra K into it.
Marcus
0:06:07
So a K-A, so can I have that Kaspoon, can I have this Kathing, can you get me that Ka-at? So it's just the same...
Alexis
0:06:16
But is that like that in Uganda, is it just at home?
Marcus
0:06:19
So it's like that in Uganda, then families taking that over here, and then within my house, that's something that I would say, within my house. So there's like a level of, I might like bend my language somehow at home, and then when I'm outside with my friends, then it's more, what do they call it now? Multilingual London English, MLE?
Alexis
0:06:39
You can switch.
Marcus
0:06:40
Yeah, code switching basically. So we've been code switching since the beginning, and what I would like to show is that I've been code switching between some of the Cockney influence that I used way back when, that I feel embarrassed to even say right now because it's just so old now And a lot of the copies of them down then there's the multi Lingual London English. So now there's influences of different things. So it's like someone might say I Beg you give me some I beg you give me a drink and that actually has influences from Nigerian pidgin.
Alexis
0:07:14
Does it?
Marcus
0:07:16
Yeah. Yeah is from Nigerian pidgin. So, it's to say that someone would say wagwan, which obviously comes from the Caribbean, they might say, I beg you, let me do this. Or they might say, if you're having a conversation with someone, and you feel that people are shutting you down and not giving you an opportunity to finish what you want to say, you would say to someone, can you let me land, please? And that comes from Nigerian pidgin as well. That kind of forms the basis for this East London linguistics that we use that at one point was strictly Cockney, but now it couldn't be anything more different. But I've grown up in an era where I've been able to see a little, the end of the Cockney aspect, where people older than myself were speaking in that way, whereas people my age or my generation are speaking more in this type of vernacular.
Moona’s Story by Johnny - Newham Community Project
Moona
0:00:00
Yeah, like East London, the place where I've been living, residing currently, there are lots of people from Hyderabad. So, on the way, even if I'm just passing through the shopping centre, I can come across those dialects and those people are surrounding me. Most people, you know, like, we use some Arabic phrases like Inshallah, Mashallah so and there's one Italian girl, Franca, her name was. So she just so eager to know like more words like that and she's so interested in learning those languages. Even Bollywood movies, she's a fan of that so she wants to learn Hindi, Hindi words and she was interested and all. She shows a great interest for that.
Pamela’s Story by Alexis - Deep Boroughs
Pamela
0:00:00
We lived in a small community in Canning Town. Everybody knew everybody in terms of their Black Caribbean and Black African community. So we may have picked up phrases from other cultures like a little bit of Patois from my Dominican friends and all that, I can't repeat them. It was all the swear words that learnt how to say first. And then you pick up other bits and pieces from other cultures. It was heavily Jamaican-dominated and a lot of people didn't really appreciate there were other islands in the Caribbean as well. So to be part of the pack meant that you had to maybe give up some of your culture to be part of the majority. So that happened quite frequently because you wanted to be in the majority about something, you know, so and as I said our parents policed us, so you know it wouldn't be uncommon for a character like Mrs. John, my friend's mum, to say oh I saw Pam on the street or I saw Pam at Rathbone Market or you know I saw her at 10 o'clock at night or whatever it is. I mean we would, the parents would police each other and no doubt my parents were also informants and telling their parents what their children were up to or not up to. So it was quite a small knit community from other islands that stuck together and knew each other. Wagoon would be one. So you would have the nod, so if my dad saw another man in the street whether he knew him or not, you gave them the nod that said, I see you, yeah, and they would give the nod back, that was one of them.
Alexis
0:01:43
and then wagoon is?
Pamela
0:01:45
What's happening. What's happening. Yeah, and that seems to be like a universal phrase.
Alexis
0:01:49
So it's like W-A-G-O-O-N, Wa-go-on
Pamela
0:01:55
I think that's how I've spelt it, yeah.
Rupiyah’s Story by Moona - Newham Community Project
Rupiyah
0:00:00
Everybody nearly speaks English but there's a high majority of people who speak Bengali and Somali which I didn't come across there I don't speak any of them two languages, I do speak a bit of Gujarati and Punjabi and Urdu so that was something new because in Manchester there wasn't any Bengali people. So I made good friends with some of them. Some of them I met through work, schools, neighbourhood.
Moona
0:00:37
So now you are able to capture those languages. You can communicate.
Rupiyah
0:00:42
I can't speak but a lot of people that I know do speak English so it's okay. But then I do get to find out about how they celebrate their culture, the different events they have, the different ways. So it's been a good learning curve for me.
Moona
0:00:58
You enjoy the multidiversity?
Rupiyah
0:00:59
Yeah, I think it's quite nice. But if you're looking for a quiet life, Manchester would be the place.
Susanna’s Story by Shahina - Carpenter’s Community
Shahina
0:00:00
Do you enjoy school?
Susanna
Well I don't go to school anymore. - Did you enjoy it? Well yeah, I did enjoy primary school, I enjoyed nursery very much, it was my, you know, fine moments. I enjoy it, I look back on it. Whether I enjoyed secondary school, I mean it's been an experience, it was definitely an experience, but I wouldn't say it was the best experience. I don't think the education system were really set up to meet all the children's needs, especially not mine either. I feel there was no inclusivity in the sense as well. But I do think that's changed a lot now. We did have an element of diversity but again, it's more diverse now. Sometimes I think there wasn't any space for our parents. They didn't have time, they had very limited English, my parents were unable to express what they wanted for us at school as well. They were unable to explain certain things. So I guess in a sense where those things were in place. I don't think it was the best experience, but I don't think it was the worst either.
Vera’s Story by Alexis - Deep Boroughs
Alexis
0:00:00
Do you speak many languages or Portuguese?
Vera
0:00:03
Portuguese, yeah. Portuguese. Because Brazil is colonisation from Portugal. And you talk Portuguese. I try to connection African people here to learn about Yoruba. Because it's good to keep African language too.
Alexis
0:00:24
Do people speak Yoruba in Brazil as well?
Vera
0:00:29
In the African religion in Brazil, Candomblé, and Ubanda, specifically Candomblé, it still have a lot of words in Yoruba. Oh, okay.
Alexis
0:00:44
But you speak it?
Vera
0:00:45
No, I have an interest now, because in the Afro-ID organization you have a project, the name Baobab, to talk about specifically black Brazilian culture. It's involved with Yoruba. - Which language do you speak? - It's Portuguese, a little bit Spanish, because it's like similar. And now I try to improve my English.
Alexis
0:01:22
And you speak English in local. So how do you find the people and the English language locally, when you live in Stratford, Maryland? How did you find it? The people talking to you, did you understand them? The slang? The language?
Vera
0:01:41
Yes, I understand because they're close to my old home. Other people too, Indian, Asian people, the Russian, Polish people, yes, it's different. The immigration language. So, I work in one place with more English people. OK, I talk with them, I understand. But my community is more immigration. It's more immigrant.
Alexis
0:02:26
OK, so you find this local English, which is from East London, do you find that easy? Because you know, sometimes they speak a bit fast. Do you find the words they say OK, in this Strat-, you know, in Maryland, the English people, the people that speak English, do you find that easy? Because there's different, like, if you come from Maryland, you go somewhere else, the English is slightly, maybe, a different way of speaking the same English. Like if you know London English is different.
Vera
0:02:58
Yes, because it's about two accents.
Alexis
0:03:01
That's right.
Vera
0:03:02
When I talk to people, they say, oh, where are you from? Oh, from Brazil? Oh, yes, I know, your accent is different. When I talk to people from India, because I have a lot of friends from India. The accent is different. I understand. Many words I don't understand, Many words I don't understand, but I understand the context.
Yashpal’s Story by Suresh aka The Cockney Sikh - Solo Researcher
Yashpal
0:00:00
I was the age of around 12 years and came to England with my mother and my sisters younger than me and I couldn't speak a word of English. It was very hard. It was a strange place to be. So I went to school and it was quite difficult at the time. One, I couldn't understand anybody, couldn't talk to anybody. There was only three people in our school, foreign. It's me, Bangla boy and a Chinese boy from Hong Kong. We were at the same boat. We used to stand next to the wall and see break time and dinner time. See people, you know, our schoolmates and friends playing but we couldn't really join them because we had no way of communicating and it was plus it was a prejudice thing and at the time the other children if one started they all would join in saying, oh you smell of garlic, keep away from me, you know. There was a lot of prejudice.
Suresh
0:01:18
And this was in Tower Hamlets?
Yashpal
0:01:19
It was in Tower Hamlets, Limehouse. I won't mention the name, the school's name, but it was like that. Then slowly, slowly, the school decided to send us to another school where we'd go in the morning from nine o'clock to one o'clock to learn English. It was just like a nursery thing for us. Now we think about it. We went there and there were teachers, lady teachers, they would teach us, this is a chair, this is a pencil, you know, things like that. And slowly, slowly we picked it up. And I had a notebook, which I used to make note what this means, chair means kursi, you know, table means bench, things like that. And you know we couldn't compete with other children in the class because you know the standard, our standard was next to nothing, you know. So it was very difficult. Then slowly, slowly managed to speak English and, you know, and struggled. Then after that I left school, done bits and pieces, and here I am. You see, the thing was that, first of all it was very difficult to understand English so there was no way I could understand English music yeah but my father bought a radio it was a Russian radio and we had a big aerial stick you know the radio aerial was attached to it and it was outside and it was very difficult. We used to pick up sound from India and we were very happy to see that. You know get up early Sunday morning and watch that program and it was a bit of news and song one or two songs in it and things like that. It was only for one hour. Then slowly slowly there was a radio it up, Spectrum. I don't know, people used to listen to it. I used to listen to it, music on there. Then there was a music in the morning, the songs, a couple of them by BBC, I think. And I used to listen and then we had a recorder and we used to record things and listen to And I used to listen and then we had a recorder and we used to record things and listen to it. And now I'm into records, vinyls, I enjoy listening to them.