Are you smarter than a Year 5 swimmer?

Everyone knows how bad my spoken Mandarin is. My cantonese was improved by speaking to Aikido dudes. My Mandarin has also improve MUCH since I started teaching swimming since 2++ years back. And what the hell...most of the words are translated for me by my 6 to 11-year-old students during swimming lessons. My MANDARIN ... aha ...see below on how those kids taught me how to speak new vocabs:

English = Mandarin (contoh ayat: "said by me")


1. Straight = che (contoh ayat: "Wah lau, please la, for God's grace if you don't want to drown, che your hands!)."


2. Bengkok = wan (contoh ayat: "Your hands, please la, don't wannnn; Ni yau sze arrr?? (you wanna die arr)"


3. Push down = aann or ing (??) (contoh ayat: "Wei, I will die, not you, if you aann my hands down."


4. Swimming = yu yong (contoh ayat: Wei, why the chubby boy never come yu chui today?? (Hokkein vocab already! :P)


5. Mouth open and blow! = (man, I thought this is the most explicit of all). Some kids literally translated this phrase for me! Innocent...


6. Open = kai (contoh ayat = "Wei, for breast-stroke, your legs are supposed to kai big big like a circle and then push hard ....!!" (Hope their mothers can explain to them when they get home).


Broken also my England after speaking to my students. Still, some parents forced me to speak broken English with their kids. And again, I wonder if they understood the rest of my rojak sentence; I don't even want to know what 'DROWNING' is in Mandarin, in case those gazing parents accuse me of spreading the negativity of death (wait, didn't I said the word 'die' all this time?!).

Because of the multiple languages Malaysians speak, don't you just love being the Malaysia?? But I don't want to spread a new religion in the pool. And maybe that's why most of the time I swim alone. :)