I go lunch with my colleagues.
Initially, all of them were speaking English. However, after a while, they start talking in their own language. The worst part was that I was the odd one out.
Well, to be fair, I learned the language when I was really young so I can catch the drift. I am a junior so I dont dare to say anything. They do know that I can understand bits here and there but they still continue. Sometimes, I totally get lost and lose interest to the point, I just scroll my phone.
I know all the 4 main languages in bits and pieces – none of them fully mastered except maybe English. I am better at some while I am really bad at others.
I do speak to some colleagues in my or their mother tongue. However, due to my experience, if there are people who dont understand the language, I would switch to English immediately.
So I had a new colleague come in and he was struggling. I spoke to him in his mother tongue and to be clear, I was dicussing with him 1 on 1. However, my colleague came out of nowhere and hinted to use English. So I thought he realised how I must have felt because at least, I can understand a bit whereas he didn’t understand anything in my convo.
However, at the next lunch, he continued to do speak in their mother tongue.
I have experienced or seen other people experiencing similar things since young with every single group except English. It is kind of annoying. When I am part of the majority, I would ask everyone to speak in English. I feel powerless to do the same when I am a minority in the group.
I decided to take up classes to futher my learning in that language that I was weak in.
However, inside me, I dont feel comfortable trying to learn now. On one hand, yes, it is a skill and will let me converse with my friends better or better understand them or they might feel at ease conversing theirbmother tongue.
However, on the other hand, I feel like that it is just an excuse for them to continue this. I dont see them trying to learn about my culture or language the way I do. If I dont learn, I cannot understand what they are talking and it can affect my work as there are discussions which affects. If they dont learn any of the other languages, no loss to them.
I dont know if I am doing the right thing.
Not everyone is bad. There are people who are considerate in all groups but there are just very few of them unfortunately.