Hello, we have a special guest today. Heriberto — or Harry for short. In English it would be Herbert, I guess. And also the regular on this channel, Gus.
These are my buddies, and I wanted to bring them on the channel today to do a little comparison. For all you people who are trying to achieve fluency in English as a second language, and you’re worried, you’re comparing yourself to native speakers — you’re never going to be like a native speaker. You can achieve a high level, but there are certain things you’re always going to struggle with. Certain mistakes, certain issues. You might have an accent.
So let me introduce you to Harry and Gus, and let’s have a real, natural conversation.
Harry’s English: How Good Is It?
Professor Lao: What do you think about your English, Harry? Because I would say that you are extremely fluent — one of the most fluent people I know who is not a native speaker. But you still have some things that I correct you on. What’s your perception of your own English?
Harry: Well, I don’t know. I’ll just take your word for it. I guess if you’re saying that I have high fluency, then I guess that’s the label. I still make mistakes. I have a strong accent or something.
Professor Lao: You think you have a strong accent?
Harry: I mean, people tell me that. You tell me that.
Professor Lao: I don’t know if I would say a strong accent, but you definitely have a Hispanic accent. There’s definitely people with a stronger accent than you, but you’re pretty understandable. It’s obvious with his pronunciation that he’s not a native speaker, and you’ll hear him talk more in this video. You can hear the difference between him and Gus, who is a native speaker, even though they’re both from Puerto Rico — they had different childhood exposure to English.
Harry: I was studying English as a second language all throughout school. One class every school day for 12 years, but we’re a bunch of Spanish speakers. We don’t practice English at all. I got to practice my English later on for several reasons.
Gus: For me, every class was in English, and even outside, people would speak English. That’s a big difference.
The Mistakes That Never Go Away
Professor Lao: Harry is 30 years old and pretty advanced at English, but there are still some things. One of these things is the “in, at, on” problem — it’s so complicated because they all have essentially the same meaning.
Harry: I became aware of that thanks to Professor Lao here. I was apparently mixing them up all the time. Didn’t even notice.
Professor Lao: Even though you know the rules, you’re probably always going to make mistakes with that sometimes. There are certain things that native speakers just say automatically — it’s like breathing to us. We just know what sounds right. But if it’s not your native language, you have to do a calculation in your head.
Harry also made a mistake earlier — he said “if I did more effort” instead of “if I made more effort.” It’s the “do vs. make” problem. In Spanish, hacer covers both. I hate to break it to you, but no matter how advanced you get, you’re still going to mess up those things. It’s like me speaking Spanish — I’ll always have problems with certain things that just don’t exist in English. You can be fluent, you can be advanced, and still make simple mistakes. It doesn’t mean you’re not advanced.
How Harry Got Good
Harry: I started debating people online. I joined a Discord server and started discussing vegan ethics with people. At first I was very nervous. My English was bad. But I improved it online, and then I got to a point where I was confident enough to do activism in real life — in meat space. I started debating random people at the beach.
Now I’m a surf instructor. I give surfing lessons to a lot of tourists, so I get to practice my English a lot.
Professor Lao: Ari improved a lot by debating, but that’s kind of advanced stuff. You might not feel like you’re ready for that. But whatever you want to improve, you just have to do it a lot. You need to speak. You could talk to yourself, you could talk to AI. You just have to speak. It takes many years.
Just Friends Hanging Out
Now we’re going to try to have a normal conversation that we would have in real life if the camera wasn’t on. So you can get a feel for overhearing us talking — a group of friends hanging out.
Professor Lao: Gus, how was the bike ride today?
Gus: It was fun. I did 70 miles. I went to Fajardo, came back. Some [ __ ] driving though — it was crowded where Piñones is. There was so many [ __ ] cars. The last part was annoying.
Professor Lao: This guy is an elite-level cyclist. He doesn’t own a car — goes everywhere on his bike.
Gus: I saw a pig on the ride. Running along a fence. The cutest thing I’ve seen in three years.
Professor Lao: Wild pig?
Gus: Wild, yeah. Well, I don’t know if they’re actually escaped from a farm. I saw a lot of cows too. I’ve seen some horrible [ __ ] — people horse-back riding and they’re really fat and the horse collapsed one time.
Professor Lao: I had a pet pig growing up. One day I came home from school when I was seven. My dad goes, “Come down to the basement, I got something to show you.” There was a piglet running around my basement. They found this random pig running along the side of the road. My stepmom took the pig in. I got to name him Wilbur — after Charlotte’s Web. He lived about seven years.
The Abandoned Building Incident
Professor Lao: This guy when he does his cycling, he explores random abandoned buildings.
Gus: I saw this building in Culebra — completely abandoned since the ’70s. It looked interesting, so I wanted to explore it. I went up the stairs — rusty ladders. I got up all the way, totally fine. When I got back down, on the last third step, the thing broke and I cut myself with rusty ass metal.
Harry: He had to get a tetanus shot. Like 30 stitches.
Gus: I didn’t feel anything. Adrenaline. Afterwards it hurt a little bit because they put the stitches on and they touched the bone. It got all the way to the bone.
Professor Lao: I thought he’d learn his lesson, but then when he recovered, I saw him on Instagram exploring another abandoned pier.
Gus: I’m pretty sure I’m more careful now. Those ladders looked sketchy.
The Vegan Crew
Both Gus and Harry are vegan. We’re not vegan because we love animals — we’re vegan because we respect them. We extend moral consideration and basic rights to other sentient creatures. People already feel that way about their dogs and cats. It’s the same thing.
They’re also my gym buddies — we go to the gym three times a week. Gus is a vegan athlete, and people always leave comments saying you can’t be strong as a vegan. He always refutes them in the comments.
Setting the Record Straight
People used to assume stuff. Her and Gus are NOT dating. We’re just a bunch of pals. Nobody’s dating. Stop being a matchmaker out there! And no, I’m not going to date you either, calm down.
My favorite comments are from people who genuinely support the channel and talk to me like a friend — like an equal — in a normal, non-romantic, non-creepy way.
Cars vs. People
Gus: I think driving is way too overused. Other modes of transportation should be given more priority — cycling, public transportation, walkability. We’re going to run out of lithium. The cities right now are more for cars than for humans. It destroys community. People just go from one box to another — from their house box to their work box, transporting in a car box. They don’t have to interact with anything outside.
Professor Lao: I would love to live in a world where everywhere you walk is a paradise for humans instead of barren land for cars.
Harry: That’s one reason I enjoy living in Isla Verde — it’s one of the most pedestrian-friendly places in Puerto Rico. Walking distance to the beach, grocery store right next to me, several pharmacies. I usually skateboard to work. Compared to the rest of Puerto Rico, this is one of the handful of places that’s pretty pedestrian-friendly.
Gus: I’m originally from Ponce. There’s nothing close to this in Ponce. You need a car there.
Wrapping Up
Professor Lao: I think we should wrap it up here. I’m hungry.
Gus: I haven’t eaten anything since the bike ride. I’ll just cook some simple stuff in the air fryer — tofu, veggies, sweet potato, black beans.
Professor Lao: What are you guys going to do for food?
Harry: I’m going to check out the grocery store, see what I find.
Professor Lao: And then we can go to Goodwill together?
Gus: Yeah, let’s do that. We love Goodwill — we bond over thrifting. It’s cheap, and it’s sustainable.
Well, thank you for listening. Check out Harry’s channel — he does debates and philosophy content. And for those of you who watch till the end — love you. Bye!