I'm beginning to see how rare it is to find a Haitian who speaks only one language. They all speak Creole, English, French, Spanish… I even found a guy who spoke a little Arabic. (He said he read about the Middle East in the Bible and was interested to learn the people's language. When he had access to a computer-which wasn't often- he went online and looked up and listened to words).
Here, switching in and out of languages is rather common. When I tell people in Abu Dhabi that I speak four languages, they are generally impressed. But here, that's completely normal. I met a local family that had one brother who spoke French and Creole and the other who spoke Spanish and Creole. So, who taught him French? Who taught the other Spanish? When I asked them, they said that since the languages are so similar to Creole, they teach themselves.
Everyone here is very studious, eager to learn and always looking for ways to better themselves, and that's great. Just in general, I find this language-switch-depending-on-who-you're-talking-to very interesting. And it's not uncommon where we live- I know a lot of people who speak a different language with their parents than they do with their siblings, even I do it- but this is different. This is an entire population who don't have nearly as many resources to learn new languages as we do and that's amazing. Multilingualism is a part of Haitian culture and I find that really cool.
LM
Here, switching in and out of languages is rather common. When I tell people in Abu Dhabi that I speak four languages, they are generally impressed. But here, that's completely normal. I met a local family that had one brother who spoke French and Creole and the other who spoke Spanish and Creole. So, who taught him French? Who taught the other Spanish? When I asked them, they said that since the languages are so similar to Creole, they teach themselves.
Everyone here is very studious, eager to learn and always looking for ways to better themselves, and that's great. Just in general, I find this language-switch-depending-on-who-you're-talking-to very interesting. And it's not uncommon where we live- I know a lot of people who speak a different language with their parents than they do with their siblings, even I do it- but this is different. This is an entire population who don't have nearly as many resources to learn new languages as we do and that's amazing. Multilingualism is a part of Haitian culture and I find that really cool.
LM
