Why Don't We Learn Mandarin and Tamil?

I watched a recent Astro ad for its TV IQ channels and I was pleasantly surprised to see that they showed malay kids who can speak tamil and mandarin.
I think it's a good idea to learn Mandarin or Tamil or Both. If Malaysian indians and chinese refuse to be fully commited in plans for racial intergration, the malays should enforce it by learning their languages.
The way I see it, language is the most powerful and effective barrier of intergration. B. Melayu has been the bridge of communication of all Malaysians for as long as I can remember but native languages are still preferred in households, schools, offices, and the list goes on....
I think all Malaysians should know how to converse in varying degrees of fluency in bahasa, mandarin and tamil. If you think that's hard, bare in mind that most europeans are fluent in at least three languages.
I just think its unfair that chinese and indians has a linguistic advantage over the malays. We cannot force the chinese and indians to forget their native languages but we can force the malays to learn mandarin and tamil.
I think I've to learn to speak both tamil and mandarin!
Starting today!
Vannakam!

12 comments:

agonY_chiLd said...

like u can read my mid..im thinking of taking Mandarin class...although I'm Malay.

in Mukhsin, Mukhsin asked y Orked learned Mandarin and Orked answered because she already knew bahasa melayu.

She's rite. Try meh..

Afiq Deen said...

ma... and meh... are endings for questions lah.

Correction:

She's rite. Try lorrr..

agonY_chiLd said...

now what? mandarin class meh?

And I care not.. I still want to talk dat way...mehhh...

LOL :)

Afiq Deen said...

Im just saying... U'll make a fool of yourself when u speak chinese with innapropriate use of mehh.. It's like replacing lah with kah in bm.

agonY_chiLd said...

fool? uhuhuh... I'm hurt..

KakaXY said...

lei kong mey ah?
ngo em chi mandarin..ngo chi cantonese siew siew. tak mou?

RITZ CHEWAN said...

penang lang hokkien tui...

andi said...

great thinking afiq. lets doit !!

Diran said...

here here!

bytheway, its vanakam

Afiq Deen said...

Aiyo, really ah? I'll change d spelling ASAP...

KakaXY said...

still not changed..

1ondoncalling said...

Thing is most European languages are inter-connected, hence it's easier for them to master another language. Eg, English, German & Dutch are grouped under Germanic. French, Spanish and Italian are under Latin. They all use ABC.

Chinese, Tamil and Malay are totally irrelevant, they don't share a common writing system.