What's wrong with my tongue?

This morning while doing my daily Arabic study I said something that made me laugh. Actually, it's not so much what I said, but the sound that I made that made me laugh. But in order for this post to make any sense I have to explain a few Arabic terms.

The word for "Yes" is "Na'am;" the word for "No" is pronounced either "La", "Le" or "Lu" depending on the accent of the person you're talking to. Additionally, they use the sound "Ah" to mean something like "Yeah." (This "Ah" sound causes me a lot of trouble because I find myself making this sound when I understand something, like "ahhh....oh right" in English, but my language helper thinks I mean "yeah" and that I am agreeing with him. I've learned that I have to be very concious of every sound coming out of my mouth.)

When speaking Arabic and I'm asked a "yes" or "no" question, I find that I have a hard time not speaking my initial response in English. Instead of answering in Arabic, I usually just say "Yes" or "No." It even comes out as "yeah" or "nah/naw" if I'm being lazy.

I am aware of this problem and I've been trying to quell it recently. Today I was asked a "yes" or "no" question. About halfway through my answer I realize that I'm saying "nah" and decide to rectify this. So I quickly say "La, la, la." That would have been fine, except for the the fact that I said this all so quickly that it ran together in one unintelligible utterance. What came out was a sound quite similar to the phrase from a certain Christmas carol that goes "Tis the season to be jolly, Fah La La La La." The ridiculousness that came out of my mouth was something like "Nahlalalalala."

My sudden outburst of seeming glossolalia caused an eruption of laughter by both my language helper and myself. I'll admit that there's nothing like embarrassing oneself to correct a problem. The rest of the lesson I had no problem with saying "Na'am" or "La." I'm thinking of trying out a new language program in which I just constantly embarrass myself with the hopes of shaming myself into learning.

In all honesty, language is going great and I am excited about the progress I've made, but I still have a long way to go. I will keep at it and let you know when I make a fool of myself again, because it's sure to happen.