I.C.E. Club – Madagascar

I plead guilty. I do apologize for the stupid (and unforgetable) mistakes I made in our last newsletter. You guys no doubt have noticed it – if you are in our mailing list. I thank HL and Suki for whispering it.

Making mistakes won’t kill you

I decided to write a post about making mistakes (we are talking about English language here) because I know I can’t help making some when I write or speak English. It’s also one of the reasons why people are reluctant to speak or I may say to practice their English within a group, in a public place or during an EC meeting.
I had talk with some people that are in the English world here and they almost say the same thing. “When you talk to a native speaker there is less fear of making mistakes because he knows that it’s not your mother tongue. And the most important thing I guess is that the idea passes, we understand each other. But when we are between Malagasy you feel this pressure that the other one is waiting for you to make mistakes.”
Often, when Moma receives new comers they ask to be corrected. We do it every other time, we collect members’ mistakes and at the end of the meeting we all go through them to see what’s wrong. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. There are members who still make the same mistakes, that doesn’t prevent them from actively taking part during the discussion though. You guys should meet Solohery, he’s the kind of person who doesn’t care about what the others think of his English. He joins the club to practice and that’s what he does. Ask Andry how hard it is to stop the guy on issues about environment or politics.

Don’t make the same mistakes twice

I happened to attend a class in an English Institute in Tana one day and there was this funny guy from South Africa, he’s Malagasy but was in SA for 2 or how many years I don’t remember anymore. He asked the teacher if he could take the floor to say some words. Mr Andrew agreed. Then he went on telling what he’d been through before going to SA and at the end he said “English is not your mother tongue so you are allowed to make mistakes, the  most important thing is that you don’t make them twice”. Too right I said to myself. Since then each time I have someone telling “I’m afraid” I just quote Andry (left). Some years later, he heard about us and came up. He didn’t change at all, always so funny. I say hi to you man if ever your eyes come to read these lines.

Now chill and enjoy your practice

I hope this post will help you make up your mind to drop off this fear and enjoy without limits the joy of practicing with other people. Or do you still have other reasons to keep your good English for yourself :p