yeah, it was a move from Japan. I handled that move much more in stride than my brother who's 4 years older and started out in ESL. It really set him back in terms of learning english, whereas I really had to speak it to survive, and kids are resilient so I actually did quite well. I had loads of friends by the time we left 5 years later. That move scarred me far more than that initial move.

I was talking with a highschool teacher and he was saying that home-grown ESL is quite rampant these days in that kids who are actually born in Canada manage to go through 12 years of school being ESL. Their English is so bad they barely pass English. They only speak Chinese at home, and at school only hang out with other Chinese kids speaking no English, and avoid making any eye contact with teachers who may ask them something in class. That's the only time they actually speak English.