Free Creative Writing On A Cambodian Learning English In The United States Of America

Kimmon Pech is a woman from Cambodia who came to the United States of America to learn as much as she could to benefit her home country. However, she has found learning English very hard, because the language is difficult and people make fun of her. She has tried many strategies and has made her English better. She is still not fluent, but will keep working hard on it.
Pech has used many strategies for learning English, ones being more effective than others are. The ones that have helped her most are classes, listening to news and watching movies and emulating sounds. Practicing with strangers in everyday situations was also helpful, but made her feel embarrassed. She writes that vocabulary has been the most difficult, even though she uses index cards, writes words down and uses them in sentences. She like to read, yet she uses a dictionary to look up almost every word, which is not very effective. She should read easier texts before and work her way up.
Some of the effects that not being fluent in English have had on Kimmon Pech are embarrassment and frustration. She could also be misunderstood or take the wrong train or stop if she uses public transportation. It is important for her to learn English so that she may learn as much as she can on the trip, allowing her to go back home with more knowledge.
I think that when Kimmon Pech writes that she does not want to “become a silent stranger in the country” she means that she does not want to go around unnoticed, but wants to interact with people, as social interactions are very important.
Pech’s difficulties reading have mainly to do with having a poor vocabulary, which has made her read looking up every word in the dictionary. I had this problem in the beginning too, but I started out with children’s books and have advanced slowly. With respect to writing, her issues are grammar, usage, verb tenses, embarrassment and spelling. The latter is also a problem for me, as English does not have rules for how words should be written.