Is Yuriyan Retriever fluent in English? Yuriyan explains!

In an interview between Asahi News and  comedian/talent Yuriyan Retriever, she was asked if she was fluent in English.

Yuriyan said, “The feeling of speaking English is the most important thing. I don’t know why, but I often get people to say, ‘Yuriyan is an English fluent’. I’m not really fluent at all, but I think that if you imitate the look, gestures, and intonation, you can become ‘fluent’. The trick is not to be confused by Katakana English, but to speak as you hear it. “Senkyu” instead of “Thank you”. “Beautiful” is “Bu-Tifor”. It also depends on whether you speak with emotion. I think that the feeling of speaking English is the most important thing, so if you think ‘I’m fluent’ and speak, you will feel better. I’m lucky that I’m also connected to work such as acting as an English teacher in a drama. I fell in love with English when I was in junior high school. I want to see the movie ‘Back to the Future’ and talk like actor Michael J. Fox!”.

Yuriyan continued, “When I entered the speech contest in the third year of junior high school, a native teacher infused English into a CD for practice, but when I spoke as I heard it, I was happy that I was able to speak English. I’ve been speaking English ever since. Rather than memorizing English words hard, if the English you hear is easy to say, hum it immediately. If you are standing on the escalator, you will hear ‘Please watch your step, Senkyu’ as announced. If you think the movie actor’s way of speaking is insanely cool, just imitate it. It is also useful for comedy stories that speak Japanese like English. I used to think that fluently means being able to speak what you want to say in the same way as in Japanese. What changed was when I went to America for three months at work. When I greeted her and said ‘I’m poor at English’, my friend said, ‘No. You shouldn’t say it with demeaning your English’. In that case, tell me, ‘It’s better to describe it as not perfect. Everyone is like that’. For me. After that, even if I make a mistake in the word or grammar, I hope I can speak without being timid, and I just want to convey what I want to say. Even Japanese is not 100% perfect. However, I think that if you want to show off your funny stories in English, you have to study harder. The purpose is not to be able to speak fluently, but if you learn English well, you will be able to acquire various knowledge and information. You will be able to convey various thoughts in English, regardless of whether or not you receive the material. I think it is important to expand the range of your art in that way”.