Japanese

I`m so incredibly proud of myself.

"I need you to help me, please," I just asked my colleague, Yuko. We`re about to leave on Spring vacation, and I wanted to check that it would be okay for my family to visit the school in April before I left.
"You want me to translate?" she said.
"Please," I begged, and dragged her to the deputy headmaster (a man who I cannot speak to or look at without being reminded of Father Christmas: he is exactly like a younger, shaved, more twinkly Japanese brother).
"Excuse me," I said, and then looked at Yuko, "but my mum, dad and sister are all coming to Japan in two weeks, and I was wondering if it would be okay for them to come into school and have a look round?"
"Of course," the deputy headmaster said. "We`d be delighted. Excellent Japanese, by the way."
And then I looked at Yuko with round eyes.
"I just did that in Japanese, didn`t I," I told her.
"Yup. Fluent Japanese with a great accent. I didn`t open my mouth."
"And he just replied in Japanese, didn`t he."
"Yup. No English in the entire conversation."
"Shit." And then I jumped in the air and gave myself a high five. "I can speak Japanese, Yuko! I rock."

I`m not going to lie: it`s basic Japanese, and my skills are limited to really, really simple sentences. But I managed to say what I needed to say, without a translator, and that`s more than I ever thought I`d be able to do.

Eighteen months, it took me, to construct my own sentences. But was it worth it?

Hell, yes. Because now when my parents come I`ll have something to make them a little bit more proud of me.