Mother Tongue?

Last night, on the plane over to Abu Dhabi, I had a vision. I was watching “The Wind That Shakes The Barley”, and I realised something that had a profound effect on me. You know how some things just have an impact on you? A “Copernican Revolution” so to speak, where nothing changes, and yet, everything changes!
Copernicus stated that the earth moved around the sun. Nothing changed, and yet, everything changed!
Perhaps it was the combination of the movie and this book that I bought, the very interesting “Mother Tongue” by Bill Bryson…
I was sitting there, the lights of the cabin dimmed, my headphones on my ears, the shouts of the boys giving their lives to free Ireland from the British reverberating through my eardrums, and I realized, here I was, my mother Irish, my father Jordanian (originally Palestinian) and what language do I speak? English! What language? The language of the country that took my parents homelands away from its people. That placed Ireland and Palestine in the situations that they are in. Ireland – divided. Palestine – a hometown for the jews.

Therefore, I am going to learn Gaelic, and I am going to perfect my Arabic. Young men died for the freedom to speak Irish, and now, hardly anyone in Ireland speaks the language. Its a shame. I will persevere and I will speak the language that my Irish blood dictates I should speak. I will persevere and not stop until my Arabic is of the standard that my Arab blood says it should be.