At home, I do speak English, mostly with my grandmother cause she can speak proper English. I also speak English with my friends but they do not like that because they think English is for bookworms. Sometimes I even forget and I just Speak English throughout the whole conversation and they just get bored. I use English to initiate conversations with people I do not know, so we can understand each other, since I do not know what language they speak(their first language), so English acts as a connector between me and other people. People who know me know that I treat English like it is my first language and that I love the language. I would die for it(just jokes).

English has opened a lot of opportunities for me because I would not be here if it was not for it. I also would not be an English teacher if it was not for English. I am in university right now because of the English language. I am so grateful for all the opportunities that the English language has opened for me because they have brought me this far. It was my daily prayer for me to get here. Every time when I speak English I feel as if I am myself more than I can be. I feel authentic but then I also feel as if I am neglecting my first language which is IsiXhosa, and I do not like that feeling. My grandmother told me to embrace what I love because that is the real me, and I love the real me.

It was not hard for me to learn English because I am naturally a smart person, even my pre-school teachers saw it was best for me to start school at four years old so that is why I finished school at the age of seventeen. It was the same situation with my brother because he also finished school at the age of seventeen. I guess my family is full of very smart people. Sometimes when I speak English I code-switch because it is better that way since my friends understand me better that way and a lot of people from where I come from can see that I am communicating with them.