What happened when I went abroad without being able to speak the language?

Hello, I'm Minato from TeamSpirit Singapore.

It’s been a year and three months since I’ve come to Singapore. A year ago, I didn’t speak English well, and I’m still not good at it yet. Compared to before, I’m better at speaking it. However, even as I write this article now, my skill hasn’t reached enough level to do that.

The theme of this article today is that I just want to say thanks to my colleagues.

I originally intended to write something closer to a company’s advertisement for TeamSpirit Singapore, but I ended up writing my honest feelings instead. So you might feel a bit weird about this theme.

In the first place, the reason why I am here is that I met a great opportunity to come here. I always longed to work in English. At that time, my president Ogishima offered me the opportunity to go to Singapore. Everybody says that you don’t have to miss a great opportunity if it appears out of nowhere. I did so too.

I thought of it with optimism at first. My skills were going to improve automatically in daily life and work. After a year, I intended to be fluent in English.

However, the reality is not so simple.

Because I couldn't sometimes keep up the pace with people’s conversation and understand what they say.

Some people look at me with a troubled face a lot of times since they can’t understand what I tried to say.

To be honest, there’s not a day when I didn’t feel embarrassment and some stress in this one year.

However, my colleagues always helped me.

My colleagues always listen to me intently and try to understand my poor English. They believe we can communicate even when I almost want to give up.

My colleague Ryan facilitated the meeting for me whenever I couldn’t express certain thoughts well.

My colleague Jerry — he always explains what I try to say with plain words on my behalf.

Prashant, Jiwei, Anni, Franzy, and other of my colleagues: I feel that every member is an excellent engineer and who always gives me excellent advice.

I want to say thank you to them.

I just realised that everybody is kinder than I’ve expected.

When I was in my country, I was a senior engineer who was always trying to be independent.

I try to do my best because I wanted to be able to do all alone.

However, after I come here, I can’t do anything alone and this is the opposite of my ideal.

Sometimes I even lose my confidence to live here.

Sometimes there’s just not enough room to think about anything.

My colleagues always help me in those times.

Thanks to them, I’m still here and gradually admit that I have things I can’t do, and it feels good to be honest and to get help.

These days, I feel that it is not bad to have things that I can’t do.

I can’t thank them enough.

I’m indebted to everyone, so I’ve had more time to think about what I can do for everyone.

It’s not big things. It’s that I just aggressively take on tasks which others find troublesome. It’s that I just buy the cakes for everyone. It’s that I just hold a small Japanese class. (Of course, I’m great at my job. Hahaha)

I believe that’s how good relationships are created.

Of course, I’ve not achieved anything and am still along the way to be my ideal self.

I intend to keep learning English and continue to improve our communication.

I think it’s that the best way to express my feeling.

Thank you for reading until this far.

If you feel something from this article, let’s express our appreciation to our colleagues.