ESL Blogs

Hello Everyone, I am Owais Sheikh. I am from the country Pakistan. I live in the city of Karachi. I work as an SQA (Software Quality Assurance) Engineer since two years.

How my path intersected with My English Club (EC) is somewhat similar to others. Although my basics were good enough in English to survive through my student years. I was very fortunate to have studied under some excellent teachers who instilled belief in me that I was on the right path. But when I made the cross over from student life to professional life, I found my self lacking in fluency and clarity. Also my job requirements exposed the deficiencies in my linguistic skills as well as communication skills.

In the first few months I was just getting the hang of things and flowing with the motion with not much improvement. As a part of my job required to manage online content, communicating and reporting to foreign clients,the common medium was English and I found my self wanting. I tried to improve by reading a lot of stuff and searching for all the stuff I can get. That brought me to My English Club (EC). At first this outlook of the website did not make any impression on me and I joined reluctantly as I thought that I may not get the response or anything much useful. I just held my self back and only tried to read and study whatever the site had to offer. I searched for the solutions of my problems assuming that someone else might have come across the same, was provided with a solution here. To my surprise I did found many a solution, I just quietly consumed it. In the beginning writing was a major part of my work, therefore, I searched for structures, paragraphing and proper usage of phrases/Idioms/proverbs. I found many a thing in very unlikely places and blogs specially. I was being an ardent reader and observer, and was not inputting anything on my behalf.

It requires some courage to put yourself in the perspective of a global audience. I was not really confident to share anything or take part in of the activities. With time my writing improved by leaps and bounds. Now the focus of my job expanded to communicating with my clients either by chatting or calling them. That forced me to come out of my comfort zone, because writing or making reports can be corrected. But being live in session with someone I never felt confident enough and always doubted whatever I had said. That prompted me to join in the chatting endeavor. For more than a year I was only accumulating and had never really set foot in any kind of activity, thus I was kind of newbie. I started chatting as I had been spared time during my job. But before diving in I observed the chat for few days and studied the chat patterns and personalities. At first I thought of abandoning because I found some really belittling chatters. But as a planned part of my improvement I tried to join in and acclimatize.

It had been just a few days that I tried to be regular. Then I found out about the new chat option. At first I thought that it was there before and I just missed it. But when I found no information about it I started exploring it myself that led to my first blog Chatting Upgraded! A new Chatting Toolbar!. I was overwhelmed with the response and was really surprised when My English Club (EC) made me a star member. I am really grateful for that honor.

There are friends and foes alike in every place, I wish to win more friends and be part of the marvelous universe of My English Club (EC).

Regards,

Owais Sheikh