Learning Farsi

           When I was a kid my mother always tried to teach me Farsi, the Persian language. When I was a baby she would read books to me in Farsi while I went to sleep. My first word was kooh, which meant “where” in Farsi, and she always speaks to me in Farsi in the household. I even partook in Farsi festivals where my brother and I joined other children who dressed up every week and learned dance routines.

When I was in 4^th grade my mom and 4 other Persian families, with kids around our age, got their kids together to start a Farsi class. I hated it because it was right after school on Friday and I just wanted to get home and relax. During the Farsi class we worked on reading and writing, every week we had homework to translate text. In class we would act out Persian plays where we each had our own roles, and since it was right after school on Fridays we would all have short attention spans. So there were many times where we forgot our cue and our teacher would get really mad. The rest of my memory from my Farsi class is limited, however I do remember that it was long boring hours. But at the time I didn’t value the importance of it.

After 5^th grade I stopped taking Farsi class because I went to middle school and ever since my Farsi speaking ability has declined. Although my Mom would always talk to me in Farsi every day I would always reply in English, and what I have noticed is that I have all these words in the back of my conscious but when I want to say something in Farsi I can never find the words for it. This is a big regret especially when I’m around my aunts and uncles from my mother’s side. I can always understand what they are saying, but because I cannot speak Farsi well, it makes it look like I don’t understand anything. As a result I feel like a lot of the times there’s a social disconnect between my family members from my mother’s side and me. I can still communicate with them in English but conversations in Farsi are much more genuine. Of course I know all the basics words but every other sentence there are a couple of words that are at the tip of my tongue but can never come out.

All in all, learning a language is hard. I know a lot of people who don’t speak fluent in their native language even though they’ve went to Chinese school or their parents have talked to them in a language around the household. Becoming familiar with a language is all about practicing and learning. As a result, words become engrained in your memory and in my case, I have the perfect scenario to practice by speaking back to my relatives and mother in Farsi. Becoming fluent in Farsi is something that I definitely want to learn before I get too old, and eventually pass down to my children.