My journey to better english

I always wanted to write a blog in English. But , I rarely can finish even one paragraph consist more than 10 sentences. Starting from today, I will write al least a paragraph  per  week for 5  consecutives weeks until the end of November. From there on, I will try to   write what ever occur to my mind every day. Yes, Everyday. I want to train my mind to think in English. I read somewhere that by writing it keeps your mind  working .  I envy so much my friends, or relative which much more younger than me that can write very well in their blog. And I feel ashamed that I cant even post a comment in English, because I feel my language is not up to the standard. It’s just a plain English.

Yesterday, the English class has started. It took place in my office. It all started when I have conversation with my boss regarding the English level  of myself and the need of English for confirmation and  for promotion for our career development. We are assessed through our public speaking, writting letters to foreign department, and presentation skill which is done in English, but none of it was used in my daily routine. Those who are posted in the Headquarters  handling policy or international relationship or industry related division have chances to sharpening their English level everyday.

I told my bos that one of the govt dept. in Penang hired a full time retired English teacher to be part of their staff on contract basis . Then finally the British Council (BC) appeard in the middle of conversation. Actually, I went to BC a day before to enroll in their part time classes but unfortunately , the term has started 2 weeks before. So, I wanted to ask my management whether they can sponsor me the fees which cost around RM600-800 . I think that is cheap enough. We have done English courses for our staff with so- called consultant that charge us around RM 8 - 10k for 4 days class,  and I personally think that I wont be so effective just to learn English in 4 days.  I also asked how  BC do corporate training  and how to begin with, and the answer was ,I just need to call BC and they will send somebody to present their package,  term an so on.

Back to the discussion with my bos, I mentioned about BC and their existence in penang. I told my bos thay they will charge about RM 500 per hour . He was shock. In fact I also was shock initially when I was told by the person I met at BC. But later on when we calculated back and divide it by let say, 15 person, that charge is relatively reasonable per person, roughly around 600-700.  Some more, it is a continuous program, week by week ( and finally  I have the opportunity to ask somebody  which part is wrong and right etc) . So my boss asked me to call BC to come our office and discuss about the training available and of course, their fees.

I was so exited and immediately make the phone call to BC , and finally after 2 weeks, the class kicked off yesterday. The feeling was like the dreams come true. First, I don’t have to fork out my pocket money, second , the time is quit flexible, if most of us cant make it due to office commitment, it can be postpone, and third it will be held at our office and it is like an official matter because the management itself want it to be done so no more meeting after 5 on the class’ day.

Ok. Back to first day of the class.   The teacher is from British Council Penang. His name is Jimmy. My first impression. Very professional. The presentation or the teaching skill and the words he used is superb. I’m impatient to wait for the next class. I hope he will have time to go through my writing and point out which part im in wrong, be it in grammatically wrong, not the right vocabulary and etc . I bet one of the comment is that this a direct translation from what I thought in Bahasa, which some people call it ‘Manglish’, but whatever the comment  from him, im glad that I finally embark on the journey. My journey to better English.