Hi. My name is Daika Muhammad, and I'm from
Somalia, in Africa--Horn of Africa--and I'm
going to be talking about my mom and her
struggles with literacy when she came
here. We came here in 1996, and none of us
spoke English. And none of knew how to write,
and none of us, knew how to read, none
of us knew how to do anything. And when we came here
we kind of had to start from scratch.
Like, my mom knew how to speak Arabic, she
knew how to speak Somali, but she had no
idea what the language was like. So upon
coming here, it was very very very very
very difficult for her, as it was for us
because we didn't know what's going on
around us. We didn't understand what was
going on, we weren't familiar with the
territory, we didn't know anything. So I
mean, we've been here for about about
14 years now, and it took my mom 14
years to develop, you know, the language--
to learn English, to actually be able to
read, actually be able to write. And she
can speak and she can understand, but
she's not as good as I am, which is not
as good as, you know, the average American
is or a person who came here when they
were younger. She actually struggles very
much, to even comprehend something
difficult. I mean, she knows a little, but
she doesn't know... she's not that
profound when it comes to English. She's good at it,
she can speak it, she can write it, but
she's not at the level that she should
be at upon 14 years of coming here. When
I talked to her--when we came here
we learned English quicker than she
did because we're younger and when we're
younger, it's easiest-- it's easier for
us to adopt information quicker. So when
we came here and we learned English, we
would teach her, and give her, like, you
know, little mini, like, 8 o'clock p.m.
after dinner, ESL classes, and we would
teach her the basics of English. Like, we'd
teach her the alphabet, and stuff like that, and
eventually she got the hang of it. And
then she does she went to school for
older ladies ,well they taught her
how to learn English, how to read, how to
be able to write and all that stuff.
She said the English language is the
most difficult language that she's ever
had to learn. And it is, because there's a
lot of words that are hard to understand,
and there's a lot of, like, silent words...
I mean, she's perfectly fluent in 2 other
languages. She's a quick learner, so she
kind of adapted to it really fast. But
like I said, being illiterate upon coming
here, and then having to start from
scratch, not only did you have to adapt
to the culture, but she also had to learn
the language and become familiar with
words that she's never known before, or
words that she had never even heard of
before, and it takes a long time. I mean,
people are always saying ignorant
comments like, "If you don't know English,
to go back to your country," or--you kind
of have to know English if you're here.
Yeah, given I mean, you're kind of
forced to know English if you're here.
It's kind of a necessity but at the same
time it takes a while. It takes a lot of
hard work. It's difficult, obviously. If
someone from America who spoke perfect
English went to another country, they'd
kind of have to be forced to adopt a
language. But it would take a while,
because it takes a while to learn a
language, especially if you come here
when you're older than a child. But
eventually my mom started going
to classes, she went to school, she
learned the language she-- And I'm so
proud of her because she does such a
good job. She can go to the lawyers on
her own, if she needs a lawyer. She, you know,
has her own business today, she's
doing great. Like, she's doing really good.
But all that stuff did not come, you know,
on top of ice cream, on top of ice
cream like a cherry.
it came with very hard work.
she's a very driven person,
so she was determined to learn the
language ,and eventually she did, and
she's proud of herself for learning the
language. She's good at it today, she
still has an accent.
She still, you know, puts in a word that
doesn't belong here and there, but
overall,
she can hold a conversation. She can do
what she needs to do in life, and I'm
honestly proud of her for that. Because
most people tend to give up on something
so difficult, because people generally
don't know how hard it is to actually
learn a language that you never even
knew before. And for her it kind of
sucked because, you know, she was forced
out of her country, not by her own will
but by the will of, you know, a war--a
civil war that's been ongoing for about
20 years now. So she was kind of a
refugee. She was kicked out of her home, her
work, her life was all misplaced--all of
it was gone. She was-- she came to a
country where she had no-- she had to
stay in, because there was no more home
for her. Home didn't exist, so she
kind of found how to find her place. She
had a find her home, she had to establish
herself in a way that she could be proud,
that she could call America her home, and
she could give her kids opportunity.
And she did do that, and I'm proud of her
for that. Like I said like a billion
times before, but I am proud of her for
that, and she did it with hard work and
determination, and I expect everyone to
do the same when it comes to learning a
language. Even if you're illiterate, if
you can't read, keep on keeping on. Just
try your hardest. Even my five-year-old
brother, he just wanted to write. He just
wanted to read. He practices even more
every single day. He's like, "Hey, can you
help me?" I'm like, "Okay, here we go again!" But if a
five-year-old can, you know, establish
himself in terms of writing and reading
then anybody can do it. And if my mom can
do it, who didn't speak the language at
all, who's an older lady, who took forever
to learn, then it's possible for anyone, so
I leave you with that. Bye, everyone.