My Serbian grandmother died in 2004. I think that was when my English started to lose its not quite right quality. I used to speak in emphatic phases. Someone I talk to every week said that I used to speak like someone else he knew and we finally pinned it down to a foreign something which was going on with the syntax. Now I speak in whole sentences but still have a problem with my accent placing me close to Sloane Square, but my brain is floating somewhere else, not willing to be bog standard British. I sometimes tick the White British box, but think that is hilariously inappropriate. Other times I make a new line for myself and put myself down as European, just to annoy or tickle the stats analysers. Not just a new line, but a whole explanation as well.
I asked a kind Iraqi man at a poetry event a question which unfortunately made him sad. I could tell, but he didn't say anything, or give an answer. I just asked 'How is your Arabic?'. In fact I then realized it was a terrible question because my French grandmother had lost bits of her French, while gaining lots of English, but not 100%, so she was not perfect anywhere. So it was probably the same story for him.
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