BGM: Blur - Parklife
Am I still a beginner about learning English? I am not joking. As I have written before, I started learning English at a junior high school when I was 13. And at a university I even chose English literature to study (I had even thought that I wanted to become a translator!), and after a certain blank I started learning English once again since I was 40. But, even though I have passed such a "long and winding road," I can't feel that I am a fluent or even an intermediate learner/speaker.
You may say this must sound as a daydream - but, TBH somewhere in my mind I want to keep on having a kind of "a spirit of a beginner". In other words, that can be a huge curiosity or a certain motivation. This idea might come from my childish character. Basically, even though you can think this is too much, I say I am childish therefore I can't stop thinking/asking about various things.
If I say I am a beginner, then it can mean that I am still young and immature about learning. In other words, I am incomplete about learning - even though actually my age is becoming 49 this year. About this, I choose to follow some ancient Asian (Japanese, and also Chinese) philosophical ideas. I translate one of them into English roughly - "The sun is setting, but the road still lasts (日暮れて道遠し)."
Today I worked early, and after that I went to the English class. This time, we learned about various traditions about celebrating birthdays. How can we celebrate them in their countries' manners? What kind of foods do they eat, and what kind of cards do they send? It was also an interesting lesson.
And when I think about this kind of topic, my idea finally comes to this conclusion. It is this - the power of our boundary/connection seems to be almost infinite. Looking back to myself, I couldn't have thought that I wanted to learn English again at 40 if I had been still alone. At that age, I met a friend of mine. She praised my English - and I decided to learn again. Therefore I want to "taste" this kind of opportunities of learning preciously, one by one. And my learning still goes on...
