Languages

Living in the UK means that I'm most of the time surrounded by people who only speak English fluently. So naturally they're curious how I function with my English and I have to answer questions like in which language do I dream or think.

These are really difficult questions for me to answer. It takes me a while and I don't think I can give a proper answer.

I have at times had a conversation and then had to afterwards contemplate did I just speak Finnish or English. When I'm forming a sentence I sometimes stop to look for the right word and I go through a list in my mind first in the language I'm currently using and then try the other language to see if it would remind me of the word I'm looking for. Most of the time I'd say it depends on the context which language I use. English tends to be dominant because I live mostly in an English-speaking environment.

But what makes me uneasy is that I find it easier to communicate in English. Most often I translate English phrases directly into Finnish rather than the other way around. My brain is attuned to English. But it's also weird because I'm not a native speaker so I'm not perfect in the language but I'm still better at it than my own native language.

Finnish is a difficult language. Me living abroad and studying in English means I don't write in Finnish and only speak with friends and family. Because of this also my dialect in Finnish is overly Lohja, I'm not hearing much else. So the grammar said byebye already in sixth form and whatever remained was gone a long time ago. I get asked where I'm from in Finland when I speak Finnish because I speak it a bit funny.

Same here in Cardiff. Most people outside from Britain would say I have a British accent. Some English think I have a Welsh accent. But those from Wales have a hard time pinpointing where I'm from, they usually guess something along the lines of Canada and South-Africa.

I guess I'm just ambiguous.