Suddenly I scared everybody!
From writing, sms-ing and especially from leaving a comment on me bloggies. Muahahaha! Baru gertak pasal grammar, dah termati segala pucuk untuk menulis dan mengomen. Well, actually I am the kind who is easily impressed. Enough if you send me short text messages spelling everything out, capitalizing the first word in every sentence. If your sms is shorter than 160 characters, tulis je lah in full. Guna je lah auto-speller ke, spell-checker ke, wood-pecker ke if you have to.
Instead of “Hw zt gng?” – supposedly a sentence that only takes 10 characters inclusive of spaces in between words, tulis je ler “How is it going?” Sama je bayor 12 sen Celcom rates 10 characters ke 160 ke. Plus the auto-speller will do it for you twice if not thrice as fast than ‘hw-zt-gng’ that makes me somehow think of Awang Goneng, Peter & Zanariah Gawan Taylor’s initials (PZGT) duduk atas gunung. (Funny how my brain works – I should have asked for a CT Brain Scan together with my mother at the Kecemasan Kritikal HUKM yesterday.)
Yes, I am very particular about writing it grammatically right with correct punctuations, spelling, grammar, you name it. But my kecerewetan hanya terbatas to those who are supposed to hold a very high standard of the language being written in. I enjoy looking up to rather than looking down on these so-called experts. And the language in question is konechno pa-ingliska (of course English) lah kan. Indaklah Kedazan Dusun bah!
My fussiness aside, what impressions would it leave you with if you see a sentence like below – knowing very well that it was written by a person who has his/her doctorate degrees in English?
“Did you went to the Syntax and Morphology conferrence at Seremban last two day?”
I might exaggerate this a bit, but trust me…I have seen worse! So please don’t get turned off and sengaja mematikan pucuk to write to me or leave comments if you:
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don’t have a PhD in English (yet)
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do have a PhD in English and feel like I have been back-stabbing you with an invisible red pen
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don’t teach English and don’t know any better grammar
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do teach English but know you’re as kerek as I am with grammar
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don’t care what I say because you’re in denial
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do care and would like to help me membasmi ungrammaticalism
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don’t care because your sole purpose in life is to leave comments no matter how ungrammatical
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deliberately enjoy getting me all worked up over grammaticality
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would like to get your grammar corrected by me
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have had enough of my perasan-bagus grammar
Sesudahlah Enida oi! Poei dongar gramophone rosak laei best. Bingit tingo dibuek eh.
Questa è Enida 
la Signora:
“I agrees with your totaly, bebeh. Messing up basic grammar are NOT an excuses. Very seram, indeeed.”
It’s pretty much like saying 2+2=4. You wouldn’t say 2+2=5 just because nobody’s watching or nobody’s reading your Maths blog, would you?
Ahaks! Ngah ni tak abis-abis pasal grammar kan? Sampai kengkawan yang ada masters and doctorate degrees in English pun dah naik meluat. Dah lah diri sendiri pun tak de PhD in English. Lagi mau betulkan grammar para ilmuan bahasa omputeh sekalian. Our native-speaker husbands pun tak kerek pasal English grammar macam kita. Or are they?
Wiz:
Thank you for deliberately enjoying getting me all worked up over grammaticality! Hehehe. I am deliberately enjoying the commotion. Boleh buat thesis pasal nih.
Oh no, I will not correct anybody’s grammar especially English teachers’ because I expect them to be able to correct themselves. (I only correct my own and my students’ grammar.)Muahahahaha!
Tambah-tambah yang ada masters or doctorate degrees in English. Lagi lah I dare not. Manalah tau kot-kot English Grammar peringkat masters and PhD lain sikit daripada yang I belajar daripada Mr. Santa Singh before 1996 dulu.
Maybe I yang tak cukup ilmu that “Did you go…?” sekarang dah boleh tukar dengan “Did you went…?” if it is written not for others to see. I did not KNEW. I would not KNEW. Ahaks! Kena tanya Gramma Grandpa in your house. You KNOWS what I’M MEANING? Ahak ahak ahak.
Ha ha ha Enida, think I belong in
.deliberately enjoy getting me all worked up over grammaticality
group! but definitely not in the denial group. Correct me all you want, I’m used to it. I live with a Gramma Grandpa in the house! I think I can take a Grandma at anytime of the day. Grandpa bau curut tak best, grandma always smells like powder kan?
Dearest Ngah, I belong to the butcher-grammar club.Ha ha.Like you, I actually much rather SMS in full sentences, than the hw-zt-gng, infact if I do have to shorten words, I’d usually remove one alphabet only.But takderlah extreme sangat cam hw-zt-gng tu.Now that’s extreme SMS.As for grammar, I love to learn to improve, walaupun blajar paling tinggi pun takat degree jer (orang skarang dah tak main degree), but messing up basic grammar is NOT an excuse!!! Very seram.