When I was learning English, I had a bad habit of learning two separate words that sounded similar, but had different meanings, and then, when speaking them, not remembering which was which. My solution to this was to make a new sound halfway between the two sounds, and use it for both, which gave me a very distinct accent compared to my peers, who seemed content to not bother learning at all. I’m sure this only led to more confusion in listeners as time passed, and I am remorseful.
As a linguistic parakeet, I find that I was far more proficient at imitation and copying than my friends and teachers. I can’t even begin to count the number of ways and times they completely butchered Arabic, French, and British English words I tried to teach them. Maybe I should have given up on these anarchistic humans, but that’s not the way. This is the way.
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