20 年前我是怎样练英语口语的？
In the summer of my 4th grade, I took a trip to Beijing with my family and some family friends. As we toured the Forbidden City, we were awed by its solemnity as well as the presence of packs of foreign tourists. I had never met any foreigner before, so I was overwhelmed. I wondered where all these people were from, what languages they spoke, and what they thought about China.
I had the urge to communicate with them, but there was just one problem: I didn't know a word of English. Someone in my group knew a bit of English, and he probably read my mind, turning to me and offering a quick lesson, "Just go and say 'Hello' to them." I did. I went to two tall blonds standing nearby and uttered the word to the best of my ability. Through the help of their interpreter, I learned they were from Russia. I don't remember much except that they had big smiles. We parted before snapping a photo in front of one of the palaces.
Looking back, this is a brief, uneventful encounter with a foreigner, but to me, it means the first baby step I took towards speaking English to know better about others, a yearning for making contact with the outside world, a prequel to more sophisticated conversations with people from far and wide. I pretty much planted the seed that years later would germinate and grow into a towering sequoia.
I was 11.
Back in the days, English was not offered at school until junior high, so I was excited when I started to take English classes. However, it was not a breeze and took quite a bit of getting used to. I found the pronunciations and grammatical ideas particularly difficult. As many classmates had already had some tutoring before junior high started, I felt I was lagging behind. Thanks to the patience and encouragement of my teacher, Ms. Li, I caught up fast and was soon getting the hang of the language.
Then, as now, English was a core subject on a par with maths and Chinese. Soon, however, it became more than a subject to me, as I ventured out on the streets of Pingyao, an ancient city known for its intactly preserved city walls and a then-new darling on the UNESCO World Heritage list.
The prestige certainly mattered, but it was also helped by two big factors. For one thing, Lonely Planet, a popular travel guide, helped spread the word and put the city on the map. It was so popular that it's hard not to see a traveler armed with a copy (though it was as fat and heavy as a dictionary). For another, Pingyao is conveniently located halfway between Beijing and Xi'an, two must-see cities to the majority of foreign tourists, meaning it can be an inviting stopover for travelers to spend a couple of days.
To outsiders, Pingyao was a distinctive destination; to me, it was an exhilarating fair or a massive English Corner, but so much more fun than a conventional one. By this, I mean I would spend many hours on the streets, breaking the ice and mingling with random foreign visitors. English was the magical key to an otherwise inaccessible world. It was a dancing language, nothing like a subject enthroned in the school curriculum.
Among the many interesting people I have met, some were Jews hailing from Toronto and New York, some were Singaporean and American diplomats seeking a quick respite from a hectic week in Beijing, yet others were from obscure places I had never heard of before (Suriname and Gabon, to name just a few). The national, racial, cultural diversity was dazzling.
I came up with a meticulous plan that prepared me fully and made speaking English less stressful. At first, I could only understand a little English, so to make it work, I bought a book on spoken English and used it as a reference book. First, I would ask myself what questions I could ask strangers, what their responses would be, what questions they'd have for me, and how I could answer them. Second, I would note down the answers and pick relevant phrases and sentences from the book. Then I would play the imaginary conversations in my head and write my own scripts, so to speak. Finally, I would rehearse the dialogs again and again to the point of memorization.
It worked. Not only was I able to reproduce the language I had worked so hard to prepare, but also I found my English was far more able and flexible than I thought. In retrospect, it is not hard to see why: in real-life conversations, I could take in nonverbal cues and make sense of what I didn't quite get; also, conversations are fluid, which means I could instinctively use the context to puzzle out certain questions. As my speaking kept improving, I was able to imitate my interlocutor on the spot. I could even improvise.
Learning to speak English was not the only gain. Most people I met were friendly, tolerant, and encouraging. Almost every person I met gave me the thumbs up for my guts and English, even though I knew my English was far from "excellent". The more encouragement I received, the more confident I got, and the harder I worked.
By the time I finished high school, I had conversed with hundreds of people from 70 countries without having traveled abroad. Today that number stands at around 100. English has metamorphosed from that "Hello" I spoke in the summer of 1998 into a competent skill, and I, too, have grown from a small-town teenager into a well-traveled cosmopolitan.
孟庆伟 Justin
个人微 ID：justinqmeng
现象级英语联合创始人
初中英语 70 分（满分 100）
两次获雅思写作 8 分，口语 8 分
题图：2003 年和一个法国人摄于平遥古城
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