Soccer

Tonight we went to watch a soccer game - Lao vs Cambodia. It ended in a tie - 3-3. But it was so fun! This week Laos had a tournament with 6 other Asian teams. Watching this one game has made me really excited for the Asian University Games which are in Vientiane in November (I think). It's like a little mini Olympics.

I still can't get over the fact that English is "the universal language used for medicine and government and politics and blah blah blah and it helps to develop a country through blah blah blah." This is some long rambly sentence people always tell me about what a wonderfully universal language English is. I feel like I should know this more than others since I teach English as a Foreign Language. But it is still weird when I hear Lao and Cambodians talking together in English or Lao and Vietnamese speaking together in English. Shouldn't they have some Asian language that they have in common before going all the way to English? Obviously not.

I think this every time I hear two non-native English speakers speaking to each other. Tonight at the game, the announcer said everything in English.

They're next door neighbors for goodness' sake. Shouldn't they know at least a little of their neighbor's language? Do many Americans know Spanish? Some, but not many. Maybe I think they should be more like Europe where everyone knows English, French, Spanish, German, Dutch and Finnish.

This has gotten kinda rambly, but just imagine a Lao soccer player saying something to a Cambodian on the other team. Tonight one of the Cambodians was kinda angry and a Lao guy was being nice and trying to calm him down. His English must have been impeccable. I can't imagine many Lao people I know who would be able to say something nice and comforting that's appropriate during a soccer game. Maybe he was just speaking in Lao to try and be nice to the guy. But that might be more annoying.

It would also be hard to understand others' accents. My students complain of Indians' and Vietnamese's and others' accents. It does sound kinda funny hearing two people speaking English incorrectly with weird accents. But hey, they understand each other and that's what matters.

So, maybe it is a good idea to have one international universal language.