Rare Disease series: Da Foreign Accent syndrome yawl...

After Alice In Wonderland Syndrome, here's another rare disease which I think is intriguing. Unfortunately, you have to go through my usual crap in order to get to the actual thayng;

I did a pre-employment check up once on a girl with a heavy Australian-like accent. She was just about to start life as a working class citizen. You can tell by the fresh look and buoyant attitude she carried around along with that accent, unlike the rest of us who have been working too long, and it shows on our faces especially on Monday mornings. As for me, what little is left of work to spark any excitement in my soul, is basically driving there (like a maniac if i may add) and back. Just like most of you out there, I'm quite sure most of us get all excited about going to work, all dressed up, we face the sodding traffic jam with mad driving, queue cutting and hasty maniacal driving that would make the other drivers look like they are driving confused donkey carts, so that we could reach office just in time to log onto the net to see what's buzzing on Facebook and the Blogs.. I know because I send my kid to school and while waiting for work to happen, I get into the net early. Traffic jam happens on Facebook sometime around 8-9.30 am. Work for most people, starts around that time. A coincidence? I don't think so.....


Back to the girl who speaks the language of the Kangaroo, if of course a Kangaroo can speak English, just to have fun, (hey, don't want to get caught sleeping on the job now do I), I asked the girl, "Where did you study?" to which she answered,"New Zealand", in an accent so heavy, it could be used as paper weight. "Oh," I cannot resist toying around a little bit, suspecting that I may get the answer I expected," and how long were you there?". I almost choked on my own saliva when the answer was "two". I expected it to be four at least. Well, at least she was honest about it. Instead, I put on my Clinton-face when he said, "I did not have sex with that woman", and merely said, "uh", but it was my bitchy hormones that led me to resume, "I thought you were born there". She gave me what I thought to look like Toyo's face during the a.b period (that's "after botox" by the way). Message well received, over and out. I thought to myself, don't tell me you've developed amnesia from all that oxygen access in New Zealand and forgot how to speak how you've been speaking for the past 2 decades before that two years happened to you.

I just don't get it. You spent 98% of your life in Malaysia, and your first words would probably be "Mamy Poko" when you want your mummy to change your diapers, and 2 years overseas, all of a sudden you forgot your mother tongue...."the Larr Language lar". WTFish!!!

Another puzzle is some of the local rappers, the Radio DJs, even some supermarket like the Great Wall supermarket somewhere in Kajang town for instance, can have a DJ with English accent only he can understand (you know lar ; crowd in Great Wall mehh). All of a sudden, you observe around you and you notice that everyone wants to become Afro-American. Most of us grew up in places like Batang Ai, Jinjang, or Ulu Yam and even our teachers who are suppose to teach us English and Mathematics in English, are instead using Bahasa Malaysia as a medium, because they themselves are struggling (or perhaps just comfortable in an ignorant zone) to comprehend the English language. Even the school janitors are not "black". So, can somebody explain to me where did all this people contracted the accent from?

Listen to this:



Now, tell me, is this natural? Don't get me wrong. It doesn't matter which race I post as an example of Malaysians talking like some Afro American, when some have never even been to Africa nor America, (trust me, I was looking for a short video showing Too Phat talkin', yo yawl, ya diiiiiig? Adflin Shauki referred them as "Melayu melayu yang berjiwa Negro", much to my delight!!) I would, but unfortunate for "Yowbiy Biy", his video was what I found in the net. I have more Indian friends than I do Malays . None of them speak like that. As for the Malays who speak this way, I wonder how they say, "I like to eat petai, budu, jering, cincaluk and tempoyak" in that slang, because I'm sure coming from Malaysia, we have to like one of those at least!!! It's not natural. When something is not natural, you (or maybe just I) start to wonder if there's some kind of a disease that is infesting these people. Can't help it, I was trained that way, to have a high index suspicion and to explain them in a form of what we call "diagnosis".

Turned out, there is. It's called Foreign accent syndrome (go ahead and click on it to find out more)
Here are two videos depicting this disease (no, no more freaky Malaysian Black Wanabes.., or any wanabes for that matter.)




Aaaaaaaaaaaaa....so that was what it is. These wanabes are not faking it. They are actually suffering from Foreign Accent Syndrome. Basically, they suffered some degree of brain damage, that then effected their speech area of the brain. Brain damage...hmm....that figures, a lot... Now that I've got them figured out, my mind is at rest, no longer boggled. Wait, the people who came out with the term "Foreign Accent Syndrome", are they implicating that foreigners talk like they have brain damage? Hmmm.....

I don't get the part why this disease is considered rare though. Should these people who were responsible with the statistics hung out in Bangsar, then perhaps this disease may not be considered rare. Here's a stand up comedy I bumped into whilst dowin' maaah thayng yawl;



Is this disease contagious? I'm feeling my tongue getting a little stiff as I speak, a little numb if aaah may add...Yo bro, Amme do mah thayng while you playin' da thayng in ya maaaynd...phheace yawwll....oh no...it is, apparently...