#and /then/ chinese have dialects like

[gomzdrawfr]

Sometimes im reminded that Malaysian tend to have like the habit of switching up languages with no big issues and forgot that not everyone can do that

I went to the local food market, the type that is out in the open with several stalls all placed together closely and its crowded and stuff right

So I talk to my brother and sister in English, Mandarin + Cantonese to my mom and dad. If we're ordering food from the aunty uncle, we either use hokkien / fujian or Malay (depending the race of the seller)

There was a neighbouring customer who were white(think they were from America judging from the bag and general mannerism) that started talking to my dad and he was just saying how insane we sounded switching languages around HAHA

#its funny cuz if you are a Malaysian chinese growing up there you basically can speak three languages because of our education system #Malay English and Mandarin #if you're Malaysian Indian then bonus add Tamil into the mix #and /then/ chinese have dialects like #Cantonese Hakka Teochew Hainanese etc #we get so used to mixing up our languages that we just kind of forgot that not everyone does it #i think maybe some of yall have heard “Chinglish or Manglish” from Singapore which basically means using mandarin + english together #哇那个天气今天热到cannot tahan ah walao #translation: the weather is so hot that i can't stand it omg! #that was mandarin + english + malay in one sentence #yep #gummmyspeaks

[xhanisai]

I can’t believe I have to say this again.

But like.

Do not leave comments that bash on the actual show whilst ‘complimenting’ my fanworks. It does not make me happy at all IN FACT I really HATE it when people do that. 

I create stuff for this fandom because I adore the show with all its flaws and everything. I grew up with the show and I adore the characters so much. So when I receive comments or tags saying stuff like “Ugh if only the writers knew how to write like that” or “You should be in charge of canon cos canon is shit lol”, it just fucks up my mood and it makes me feel grossed out. 

There are millions of things out there to write or say to other people about their work without having to bring down canon and what the actual professionals have worked on.

Keep your gripes about the show off my work.

#miraculous ladybug #miraculous ladybug and chat noir #ml fandom salt #i've been getting too many of this crap for years and some of them just get too personal #like for example in one of my AUs for fun i had marinette be able to speak chinese in a different dialect #and i had someone who praised me for it BUT bashed on the show for making marinette clueless about mandarin #which kinda pissed me off cos like #i have chinese in me but don't speak any of the languages there so does that mean i'm invalid too? lol #and in one of my recent writing i had someone lament that they wished i was writing for the show #like okay i know you mean it in a good way and you're not directly bashing the show #but the reason i can get away with creating and characterising the way i do is because i am working on them all ALONE #with no zag or money or producers getting in the way #and the stuff i create is always aimed to an audience that #is at least 15 years old #anyways if i keep going the tags will be longer than the river thames #my point is #keep your gripes private or off of other people's work #i wanna hear about what you LIKE about what i've created #not what the show has failed to do for you and whining about it

[veerbles]

always fascinated by people's different takes on the language barrier between kaz and the ghafas.

I think my personal opinion is that kerch, being the language of the center of commerce and an overall neutral party in the war, is kind of like english - in that it's an internationally spoken language, but certainly not by everyone. considering jesper spoke it well enough to go to university in ketterdam, even though he was a farm boy, it must be pretty widespread. matthias didn't speak it until hellsgate, but he also grew up very sheltered.

inej didn't speak kerch when she was taken, so it's reasonable to assume her parents didn't either. but maybe they spoke a little of it, like in some countryside places in europe? or maybe they learnt in their efforts to find her? or perhaps they focused their efforts inside ravka, and never learnt a word of it.

it's always suspicious to me that kaz never bothered picking up ravkan, being the strategic businessman that he is. I think he wouldn't hide that ability during the ice court/van eck mission if he had it, so either he can speak very little, or not at all; if not at all, it supports the assumption that kerch is the international business language, which is why he never bothered picking up a second language.

so would the ghafas learn enough kerch to communicate? I don't doubt that using inej as a translator would frustrate kaz to no end; words are his strongest weapon, so he'd definitely put effort into being able to communicate with them. but would he learn suli? or ravkan? suli would be a more personal gesture, which he'd see as a leverage to get the ghafas to like him. ravkan would be more useful in other ways, and we know how much kaz likes having more than one reason to do something.

#six of crows #kanej #grishaverse #I have more thoughts. such as: ravkan can maybe be kind of compared to chinese (ignoring the many dialects)? #it's certainly not WIDEspread outside ravka but we do see foreigners speak it - especially if they have business there #specifically I think it's mentioned merchers and slavers know a little of it. again - a language for business purposes #zemeni and kaelish is only spoken by natives - but I think we see more kaelish immigrants in ketterdam #so it might spread a little like a lot of first generation languages #nobody speaks fjerdan. but it seems they're the most isolated country and don't do too much business with others so it makes sense #just having Thoughts yknow #OH actually wylan speaks some fjerdan which means jan also did so they scratch that they do business with kerch #kaz x inej

[liu-anhuaming]

My biggest pet peeve in language learning circles is and always has been when people call Mandarin "Chinese" even though there is not one Chinese language but rather many different Chinese languages (plural! china is linguistically quite diverse), and "Mandarin" 官話 is actually considered its own language family with even more dialects under it and not just one language. I think accuracy matters when talking about what languages you're studying

anyways, here's a tweet on this topic that has been stuck in my mind from the moment i first saw it

#i understand that not everyone is aware of this #but i have gotten in arguments with people On Here before where they were aware of this all and just didn't think it mattered #i think accuracy is super important in general for like. communication purposes? #but also just lumping everything under “chinese” feels really disrespectful and dare i say...racist #like why are people willing to split hairs about mutually intelligible scandinavian languages #but it's crickets when mandarin is given the label of “chinese” #also the idea of different chinese languages being called 'dialects' #i understand that's the word that chinese people themselves use: 方言 #but i think the implications of 方言 is different than the english 'dialect' in this situation #this is my hill i am willing to die on #like it's not a relationship ender or anything for me but i do feel it's very important to be. specific.

[oathofkaslana]

yk it is a certain type of anger when the only chinese character w a non-mandarin name is being mocked for his name. i can only imagine the anger canto players have right know, knowing that a large portion of them are in the U.S.

#gi #sinophobia cw #i know i mostly hyphenate his name for clarity but god part of me wants to take that away and force people to recognize his name as it is!!! #and it makes me so sad and angry that we have to see this happen all the time! #the thing is! even w racist players making fun of chngyun’s name it wasn’t like he was the only chinese character!! #he lives in a region full of cgaracters with chinese names!!!!! #and we can at least find some solace in that! #but you can’t do that w mingming bc he’s the only one w a non-mandarin name #and again: respectability politics doesn’t and will never work #but i also know that if he were using any other dialect that was lesser known #we’d be dealing w even more mf’s making jokes abt how they didn’t even know that dialect existed #(even now though i still see people not understanding or respecting canto) #f criti

[plsleafmelon]

I JUST FOUND OUT CHEN AND CHALTER HAVE CANTO VOICES ??? IM SCREAMING IT SOUNDS SO CHEN I CANT SWITCH IT BACK IM GOING INSANE

#arknights #ak #chen #told my mom abt this and she was like u dont even understand tho #but mom thats not the point #the point is that they exist #also sorry dad i nevrr picked up a lick of canto #why do all my cousins speak dialect except for me sobs #am i just skill issues #ok but my chinese is objectively good #so i have that running for me

[micamicster]

While you were sleeping au! You mentioned the subway and I think? The F line, a while ago. I’m curious which subway stops are the most important to the story. Also which NYC neighborhooods do you think matches the vibes of the various mdzs characters in this au/in general. Also if there’s anything you want to share I’d love to read it!

Hi honey thank you for asking! Yes we did decide on the F line, good memory haha

I've put a lot of thought into the route and setting of this story. I needed the setting to do a lot in terms of character (wealth, community, cultural background) and in terms of plot (need both my main characters to regularly take the same train a long distance), but luckily I think that neighborhoods and subways are equipped to do all of that!

I settled on both Wen Qing and Jiang Cheng regularly commuting in from Queens, but for different reasons. JC is coming from queens because his family has owned a large townhouse there for multiple generations, while Wen Qing, a more recent and more broke arrival to the city, lives out there because the rent is cheaper. Queens has its own massive chinatown, but it's more recent (comprised of a a newer wave of mandarin-speaking immigrants entering an older hokken-speaking population) compared to the historic Manhattan Chinatown (hundreds of years old, overwhelmingly cantonese-speaking). I have placed a lot of my action in the Manhattan chinatown, partly because it's historic and partly because it's most familiar to me. Both JC and WQ commute to the East Broadway stop on the F line, WQ to go to work at a nearby hospital and JC to go to his job (the Jiang family own a restaurant).

Here is an excerpt of a scene from the subway! thank you for being interested <3 <3 <3

The train shudders to a stop and they part to let people stand and push past them. He nods at the seat that’s appeared between them. “You should take it.”

“It’s fine.”

“Please. I know you’re about to be on your feet all day. Just take it, before some ass with no appreciation for essential workers steals it from you.”

“I can’t. I’m afraid if I sit I won’t get up again.” It’s the truth, but she didn’t mean to say it. There’s no reason to worry him about her. She’s stood on the train a thousand times, she can stand one more.

“I’ll get you up if you need it. Promise.” He nudges her forward gently. It’s just the drag of his knuckles against the small of her back, but she sways into the touch before she can stop herself. Hastily Wen Qing overcorrects the other way, and drops into the seat as quickly as she can.

At the next stop even more people crowd on, pushing him forward. He scowls and braces himself with one hand on the bar above them, back stiff and unyielding. She recognizes the stance from years of navigating the subway at rush hour—don’t take up more space than is your due, but don’t give an inch or the crowd will take a mile.

The train takes off with the familiar rocking of the crowd, as people lurch forward and back, renegotiating space and balancing against each other. It sends him stumbling right up against the seats, his leg knocking into hers for a moment before he catches himself.

“Sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

He looks at her carefully, like he’s searching for any sign she didn’t mean it. He steps closer, letting the people behind him expand into the extra space in the way that crowds are always so liquid. She shifts to let him even closer, his leg settling between hers, his knee braced against the hard plastic edge of the seat. Whenever either of them shift it sends the expensive wool of his suit dragging across the machine-starched stiffness of her fresh scrubs.

She’s in a strange sort of sleep daze, like maybe she hasn’t really woken up at all yet. Soon she’ll open her eyes to her cold bed, her dark room, her relentless alarms. But for now she’s warm. She’s still too tired and the train is too crowded, but sitting down she exists in a little bubble, with Jiang Cheng’s broad back curved over her and his arm above them.

#actually... okay so part of what i did when i was interpreting these fantasy sects into the modern world is translate that into #characters (or their families) being from different regions in china and therefore speaking different chinese dialects #and like im a little worried that people will find that disrespectful/inaccurate because obviously in the show they all speak mandarin #but i really felt like it was the best way to be true to the setting and irl communities ive placed them in (nyc chinatowns) #and to portray that despite all these characters being chinese-american they have very different backgrounds #and of course like i said to give a sense of the sects existence #so yeah that plays in to the setting in a big way (like i said Manhattan chinatown is almost all canto) #sorry for the only tangentially related tag ramble. i have a lot to say haha #while you were sleeping au #wip tag game!

[myname-isnia]

Naming OCs actually sucks so much sometimes, especially when the creators of the source material have no fucking idea which culture they’re drawing from

#I’m trying to name Ghazan’s parents okay. cause if I continue my Haya fic it’ll come up #and the process just made me realise how much of a mish mash of cultures the avatar world is #and how hard it is to pick a name that would be appropriate #sometimes I wish I was 12 years old again and just picked stuff that sounded good #like there’s literally no reason for Suiren and Midori to have Japanese names considering ming-hua’s is Chinese and Ghazan’s is afghani #but again I was 12 and it’s been way too long and way too many connotations to their names have been formed for me to change them #just assume that since they’re in the red lotus their parents wanted to pick names separate from their respective nations/cultures. ok? ok #anyway back to my main point #I started with looking up origins for names I knew. particularly Ghazan’s bc I picked Haya’s on a whim #literally writing the first chapter of SotRL and typing up the first name that came to mind #which accidentally ended up being my actual distant aunt’s name oops #point is. it’s apparently hebrew. which really just throws everything off #so I looked up ghazan’s and it’s from an afghani dialect I believe. don’t take my word for it though blame google if I’m wrong #I checked multiple sources so I’m 80% sure if it #so I’m like. okay. and opened a list of afghani names on the side #then I remembered my recently adopted headcanon of Ghazan’s parents being originally from si wong desert #so I looked the sandbender tribes up and that’s when I started losing my mind #known names range from mongolian to chinese to thai #the sandbenders themselves are clearly inspired by arabs and north africans #so there’s a bajillion sources and o have no idea where to start #currently just scrolling through lists and writing out ones I like #I also want to avoid names with meanings that are too religious or ones that end in -aya or -an #so it’s a struggle lmao #there was a point when I thought it’d be funny if I named the mom Niloofar or Nilüfer cause it also means water lily like Suiren #but then decided it might be a bit too on the nose. I’m not really too into the whole ‘name your kids after family’ thing #even if it’s tangential #idk. it’s a cute idea but probably not the right call #writing woes #kind of

[littlesistersti]

"You found a Vietnamese (female) character in Marvel comics"

"Their name is just Chinese gibberish."

All of their stories were something relating to the Vietnam Civil War but the old comics had that obvious Red Scare sentiments anyways

#marvel characters #marvel comics #marvel memes #Looking at Sha Shan and Xi’an Coy Manh #We don’t have sh consonant cluster and we don’t apostophe #I heard that one of the Vietnamese characters with Chinese gibberish name got corrected in later comics #Ah yes the power of retcon #You know I would probably accept it if maybe she’s half Viet and half Chinese but the sh sound doesn’t quite exist in Viet #Well it does but not like that and depends on the regional dialect #At this point I’d name both of them Xuân #xi’an coy manh #sha shan nguyen #aapi community #asian representation #vietnamese representation

[deus-ex-mona]

[shakes the duolingo owl threateningly]

#d u o l i n g o w h y don’t you have the language i wanna learn?? i’m sadded :(((( #i want to smacc the me from like 10-13 (wtf am i really that old) years ago for slacking off during the conversational 3rd language classes #i could’ve learned something too!! but noooo all i know is how to count to 5，how to say ‘watercolour’ and ‘pig’… #…and ‘don’t know’ and ‘don’t have’ (but i picked up those two phrases from work lol) #so i’m left out of the loop of p. much all the juicy work convos and i’m sadded at the lack of good gossip— #but man… this new non-chinese staff member can speak chinese better than i can and i’m just. a little shook tbh #tfw you can only speak english，can barely speak your mother tongue language，and know like 3 phrases from your dialect group #just how are people able to learn languages so easily?? aaa???? i’m soooo envious???? #i’m only able to (kinda) read japanese bc the sentence structures are similar enough to chinese sentences… and bc i watch too much anime #(though i think i read too much japanese text that i can no longer read chinese texts whoooops—) #so anyway. yup. that’s just my angst of the day… ig #tune in tomorrow where i’ll cry about being unable to focus on the yujiro event epilogue bc the vbs cover of yy is on loop in my head and— #inedible blubbering

[tlaquetzqui]

So apparently Hakos Baelz is a Chinese-Australian, who speaks but does not read Chinese (specifically Cantonese—no judging, hanzi are hard). Which is why she, along with Ina, sings the Korean parts in the Hololive cover of “Pop Stars” by K/DA: Cantonese and Korean have all the same sounds except geminate consonants, and Cantonese having true laterals where Korean, like Mandarin and Japanese, has palatals.

#linguistics #hololive #hakos baelz #some south chinese languages/dialects of cantonese have the lateral approximant like welsh ll or navajo ł

[sun-pluto]

i think it’s a. very specific experience when you grew up being taught english as your first language, but because your parents speak multiple languages, they speak them when they don’t want you to understand what they’re saying. so instead you grow up eavesdropping and secretly learning that language so you can understand what they don’t want you to hear.

i’m pretty sure i speak for a lot of people HAHA but it’s still specific!!!

#it’s also a specific experience when you’re chinese but your parents both don’t speak mandarin #and the education system just like. holes all chinese ppl into speaking mandarin. #i grew up with SHITTY ways of learning languages and only just now realised how unfair this was to me #none of my family speaks mandarin because we use dialects #and my chinese teachers would always shame me for not being able to speak mandarin when LITERALLY wtf i was a KID #with hainanese/cantonese/malaysian parents and grandparents #how tf would i know mandarin right from the start #but anyway now i know so. it’s on to speaking the other languages well now. #i even have an astrology explanation for this. #i have pluto+chiron in 3rd #like yeah it was shitty but i still know multiple languages now #even if i don’t speak some of them fluently #i think that is still p cool #m #talking

[gingerbreadmonsters]

[head in hands] fake texting.............

#im realising now that it's surprisingly hard to write vincent as being like..... #idk how to put it #i think i project a lot of my own life experiences onto him based on very little canon evidence or similarities #but it actually makes it quite difficult to make it clear what im trying to say bc in order to show you what im imagining #i have to tell you things that are totally normal to me and that im not sure if they're generally normal or not #that made no sense let me put it another way #fun fact about me: i'm mixed race #my mum is white british and my dad is asian but was born and grew up here in the uk #so culturally i grew up basically entirely british #my dad only speaks english bc my grandparents speak different dialects of chinese #and i learnt a little bit of mandarin at school but my family in hk all speak cantonese so #and i have never really thought of my dad as being..... like.... asian #he's just my dad #and i never think 'oh i look asian mixed' bc.... this is just how i look #but when people say racist things about him #or when someone says that they 'could tell i was asian' #i have a bit of a ?????? #bc in my mind it never really registers #it doesn't help that we have a very stereotypically chinese surname #but yeah this is what fuels quite a large part of my ongoing identity crisis #about what i can do without feeling ashamed and who i feel like and where i belong #i have never felt like i know exactly what the answer is - maybe i'll find an answer one day or maybe i won't yk #(sidenote: there are VERY few people who are asian mixed and who's asian parent is their dad not their mum) #(do you know any irl?? bc i know 2 and one of them is me) #this is a very long winded way to say that i give a lot of this to vincent #not in exactly the same way but i do #i imagine him as mixed race like me #i imagine him feeling how i feel #and it makes me feel strange.... but a little bit better #he means a lot to me and i want to do him justice. idk what this says about me but i think it says something

[welcometoteyvat]

feeling ??? about ga-ming's mando with a canto accent

#a selection of the feelings: i think the reactions of diaspora s chiners are valid to want like. more canto / canto pronunciation of gaming #however it's unlikely to happen imo esp bc i think mainlander s chinese are already ok with how his accent sounds #however it should happen because the regionalism politics are real and like mando standardization etcetc etc etc if you know you know #however it's also gonna be out of character if they make him speak full on canto bc unintelligibility idk #but their english translation is already like that so?? #also i dont really expect much from mihoyo after sum.eru and whatever leaks are saying about fire nation nat.lan #i also think that holding this company; who makes everyone have erhuayin despite liyue being a harbor; to the standard that re #regional dialects are going to be fully incorporated especially from a representation standpoint is kinda unrealistic #but also its valid to want the rep idk. especially for diaspo and i dont blame anyone for feeling disappointed #and i also think they should do it because it's not even a censorship issue other games have canto lion dance charas #anyways thoughts do be clattering around in my head rn #ramblings! #this might turn into a delete later if im feeling clearheaded enough after a while

[dropespeon]

figuring out what to do with honorifics for this dcmk crossover is the most miserable experience. do you just drop them altogether. but then you lose a lot of nuance because the way people refer to each other in dcmk is So important. so do you just use the ones that are really important. but then it's awkward. so do you make it so just the dcmk characters use honorifics and no one else. but that's also awkward. it's atla so like. it's still asian. but it takes inspiration from a lot of different cultures (and also kind of fuses them which is not great). the written language is traditional chinese i think?? but then that raises more questions. like. is there a language barrier? how big is the language barrier? traditional chinese and japanese share a decent amount of characters but they're still very different so should it simply be treated as the avatar universe having its own universal language that doesn't have honorifics (but there are regional languages and being bilingual is standard? it would make sense considering the history). would japanese just be very similar to the regional language of kyoshi island where honorifics *are* standard? i am in the trenches rn

#drop #would it be easier to just drop the honorifics altogether? yeah #but i'm stubborn and language is interesting #half of the atla characters don't even have last names Get me out of here #a presumably chinese adjacent language not having honorifics is . weird though. especially if other languages in the setting have them #but using honorifics for the atla universe would probably drive people off. also it'd be a mess to make because likely nations would also #have their own dialects even with a universal language #it just raises so many questions and all of the solutions i can think of have issues #atla worldbuilding Why are you like this.

[sizzleissues]

Speak my language (1250 words.)

inspired by this post by @nervousbelieverstarfish

There was a girl behind M Damocles, her hands stuck awkwardly at her sides as she made herself appear small next to him. Adrien tilted his head to the side to get a proper look but the girl shuffled away. Adrien straightened and looked up at M Damocles. Why had he led this clearly frightened girl all the way to his shady spot in the school yard? M Damocles stepped aside, gesturing to the girl with a worried smile. 

“This is Marinette Dupain-Cheng, she's a new student here.”

Marinette whispered something quiet that went ignored by M Damocles.  There was a piece of pasta on her shoulder that she didn't seem to notice and a reddish stain on her black jacket that she definitely knew was there. Her entire face was pink as she watched him from behind her bangs.

He extended his hand — that was what you’re supposed to do when greeting new people? — and tried to make his smile warm. “Hi, I’m Adrien. You have pasta on your shoulder.”

Marinette blinked and M Damocles stepped in, clearing his throat.

“She’s just moved here from China. Very little French.”

Adrien retracted his hand. (He was glad she hadn’t understood him, why had he opened with ‘there’s pasta on your shoulder’? She looked mortified already, no need to kill her.)

“I know you’re only recently returning to regular schooling after your m-,” M Damocles clammed up, his voice trailing off. 

“My maman died,” Adrien supplied, forcing M Damocles to look him in his eyes as he said it. He was sick of people treating him like he couldn’t bear to hear the words. Maybe it was more that they didn’t want to say it, that they didn't want to deal with the consequences if he did break with every mention of her. It was a good thing then that he’d put all that childish grief away — along with everything else that would only hurt him in the long run. 

“Err- yes. That. Anyways, you’re here longer than Marinette and I read on your file you’re fluent in Chinese. You’re also in all advanced classes so you’d be the perfect fit to help Marinette get around and teach her French on the side. If you are willing to, of course.”

Adrien had half a mind to refuse M Damocles and go back to his quiet existence on the edges of the school. That was the way he liked it and nothing ever before had made him want to change that. Then he looked at Marinette and he couldn’t find it in him to refuse.

“Do you know what dialect she speaks?” Adrien asked. 

“Pardon?”

“What dialect? I speak Mandarin but she could only speak Cantonese or another regional dialect I wouldn’t understand.”

M Damocles paused, his thick eyebrows weighed with confusion. It seemed the thought had never occurred to him. 

“Marinette. Do - you - speak - Mandarin?” M Damocles asked her in broken French. Adrien saw something flick across her face that was different from her timid expression before. A flash of fire in her otherwise soft blue eyes. She silently nodded in response. Adrien saw it again as M Damocles turned back to Adrien to relay the answer though he’d already heard. He had to bite his lip to contain a snicker as he caught the sarcastic flick of her eyes. 

“Well then, that’s all sorted. I’ll leave you to it,” M Damocles said with a note of relief in his voice, glad the translation problem was no longer his. He strode off, leaving Marinette behind. She watched him leave with a surprisingly reluctant expression, even though he’d proved utterly incompetent.

“So, you’re new here?” He asked in Mandarin. Marinette swung her head around, blue eyes wide and frightened again. 

“Y-yes.”

“I’m A-.”

“Adrien Agreste. I know,” She interrupted.

“You do?”

Marinette seemed to realise what she’d done and turned bright red.

“I mean, you already said so. Earlier. I’m not the best at French but I know when someone’s introducing themselves.”

“Right…” It didn’t explain knowing his last name, he’d never given it, but he wouldn’t be surprised if the Agreste name had made it as far as China. He moved on to the side on his bench and held his hand out to offer the seat beside him. “Do you want to sit down?”

“Okay.” 

She sat, bouncing her leg as she looked everywhere but at him. Had she understood him earlier with the pasta thing? He searched his head for something to say before the silence lingered too long and it became impossible to breach. 

“You have pasta on your shoulder.”

Not that!

Marinette squeaked, shaking it off and then removing her jacket altogether. She groaned into her hands. Adrien scrambled desperately for something not related to pasta to ask.

“I- I noticed you have a French word in your name?”

“Oh, yeah. My Papa is French but we’ve lived in China my whole life. Never really tried to learn the language. Regretting that now.” She laughed dryly at her own expense. Adrien smiled at her when she looked up and she immediately went back to staring at the ground, furiously tapping her foot. 

“Why did you move, if you don’t mind answering?”

“To go here. To learn art at this school and become a fashion designer. I applied ages ago, I didn’t think I got in. Didn’t think I would get in.” She leaned back from hunching over, her voice getting a little louder as she settled. “That's probably why I didn’t really try to learn French but now I’m here and I don’t know a word and it's going to screw everything up. I couldn’t find any of my classes and then this- this, bitch, threw her pasta all over me when I couldn’t understand her. She had a claim over the table I’d chosen, apparently. People had been warning me and I couldn’t understand them fully to realise. How am I supposed to become a famous fashion designer if I can’t even say it in French!”

Marinette clamped her mouth shut and turned to Adrien with an alarmed expression. His Mandarin wasn’t good enough to have kept up with everything but he got the gist. She was completely lost and alone.

“I’m so sorry. You don’t want to hear about that. You’re the one saddled with teaching me and now I’m dumping this all on you. You really don’t have to.”

Adrien looked across the school yard to where all the other students had gathered, talking amongst themselves. Groans about homework, whispers of gossip and cheers as one student presented a graded project. He’d never once bothered to join in. Now he was sitting with this girl who was on the outskirts like him and she couldn’t join in even if she wanted to. The voice that told him to shut everyone out could be ignored for now. She would be his exception.

His only exception.

(He didn’t know now but soon he’d make another. For a girl with fire in her soft blue eyes. He’d look into those eyes as her hand reached to save him and know he’d have to make another exception. But that would be the last one) (Until the next.)

“It’s alright. I’ll teach you French until it's better than your Mandarin. And you can help me improve my Mandarin in return. Does that sound like a deal?”

Marinette looked down at the hand he’d extended then up at him, her eyes flooding with relief. She shook his hand, grinning from ear to ear. 

“Deal.”

-

OK OK OK OK. I hope you liked it, i hope it was good. Let me know or whatever. Please reblog blah blah blah and have a good day

I would write more but I have so many WIPS and I’m trying to overcome doubt in my writing so I can just write again. This is an AU to the movie’s canon but also can be applied to the show if you want. I’ve also added my own slight headcanon that Adrien was only homeschooled during the period of his mother’s sickness and ‘death’ as my interpretation of the canon given to us in the movie. Take it or leave it. So he was friends with Nino prior to everything but he’s since shut him out.

#miraculous ladybug #miraculous #ml fanfic #ml fic #adrienette #miraculous movie #miraculous awakening #adrien agreste #marinette dupain cheng #AND PEACE OUT #speak my language