In Japan, local students flock to Indian schools to learn English

[Aepsilons]

Actually, you nailed it! No offence to my Chinese friends here but that is a Chinese English accent and I like it.

He he he, you should hear Korean accent, lol.

"Aigoo! Eyum prom Corea! Eyum nat Ilbo-Nim ! I mean eyum not Jahpanes, soo please do not say I'm Jahpanes mmm. Kamsahamnida!"

 

[Aepsilons]

I wish I knew, unfortunately/fortunately for me I was mostly brought up in the UK and have not unnecessarily shaken my head. I think it may be something to do with emphasising on a word perhaps?

Lol! My one good friend does that whenever I ask her a question, she'll shake her head and smile at me. And she won't answer me directly!

 

[tranquilium]

Don't be so dismissive.

It just that my experience with Japanese and Indian speakers have not been positive and I have met a lot of Japanese and Indians. Personally, I think it has a lot to do with fact that Indian and Japanese languages has a lot of words that is similar to English (A lot of those are sound translation into the native language), but with native accent. So, when they speak English, they brought that accent with them. That by itself is not too bad, but language like Japanese lack the sound corresponding to R&L, this makes the accent very awkward and it is hard to understand that they are trying to say.
In compariosn, there are plenty of Chinese that are bad English speaker as well, but the Chinese Pinyin system actually has the full range of sound corresponding to the English phonetic system. So the Chinese speaker's problem is mainly statement structure and flow. It is still odd to listen, but at least you get what they are saying.
Similarly, a lot of Europeans don't speak English well either, but they are at least understandable due to the their phonetic system actually covering the full range of sound of the English language.

 

[Pakistani E]

Lol! My one good friend does that whenever I ask her a question, she'll shake her head and smile at me. And she won't answer me directly!

What if she doesn't really know the answer and is playing dumb? You can never tell with desis.

 

[kuge]

have u guys looked at this?

 

[Aepsilons]

What if she doesn't really know the answer and is playing dumb? You can never tell with desis.

Interesting lol! So is it similar to "I don't know" ?

 

[Established_1965]

He he he, you should hear Korean accent, lol.

"Aigoo! Eyum prom Corea! Eyum nat Ilbo-Nim ! I mean eyum not Jahpanes, soo please do not say I'm Jahpanes mmm. Kamsahamnida!"

I haven't spoken with Koreans yet but my all time favourite accent is Cantonese, they are so funny when they Cantonglish!!

 

[Aepsilons]

have u guys looked at this?

LOL

"Jolly Good!"

@mike2000

 

[Pakistani E]

Interesting lol! So is it similar to "I don't know" ?

It's similar to the Chinese students I know who pretend they don't understand when asked a difficult question. Works most of the time.

 

[Aepsilons]

Buahahahaha! Ever seen Russel Peter's impersonations?

"Be a man! "

I haven't spoken with Koreans yet but my all time favourite accent is Cantonese, they are so funny when they Cantonglish!!

 

[Echo_419]

One thing that I've been trying to decipher about my colleagues who are South Asian. They do that shake with their head; what does that mean?

Ahh you sir encountered the great Indian head shake
We tend to do that a lot

 

[oFFbEAT]

That's too bad......We speak good English.

Indians pronounce P as B, T as D, K as G, R as L.

For example, what time is it? = what dim is it?

Today = doday

That's totally incorrect, we can pronounce every English letter......infact, in Indian languages there are letters for which there are no English pronunciation, but not viceversa.....
I don't think you have spoken with any Indian in your life....or just trying to ridicule out of some personal grudge against Indians......

Chinese English: " Aiya no speaka Elish no goo, bat speaka goo den Riben ... Hai!"

WTH is that...

One thing that I've been trying to decipher about my colleagues who are South Asian. They do that shake with their head; what does that mean?

When we shake our head from side to side, it means, No/disagreement/denial.
When we shake head up and down, it means, Yes/agreement/acceptance.
Is that what you wanted to know??....I think those gestures are fairly universal.....

 

[StarCraft_ZT]

That's totally incorrect, we can pronounce every English letter......infact, in Indian languages there are letters for which there is no English pronunciation but not viceversa.....
I don't think you have spoken with any Indian in your life....or are just trying to ridicule out of some personal grudge against Indians......

I talked to them quite a lot. I have some social connections with Indians. I meet Indians everyday.

 

[dray]

Lol! My one good friend does that whenever I ask her a question, she'll shake her head and smile at me. And she won't answer me directly!

Oh! A woman! Who has ever understood them?

I am saying the truth....my Indian lecturer say today as doday, I swear by god.

One says doday doesn't mean all Indians say doday instead of today, and accents are different among Indians also, like south Indian accent is distinctly different, there is no single Indian accent.

 

[Aepsilons]

Oh! A woman! Who has ever understood them?



One says doday doesn't mean all Indians say doday instead of today, and accents are different among Indians also, like south Indian accent is distinctly different, there is no single Indian accent.

I like the sound of the New Delhi accent tho, when people speak Hindi or Urdu, it's very soft sounding. Very soothing lol.