To add to what everyone else has said: There's no dividing line between "accent", "dialect", and "language" any more than there's a dividing line between "pebble", "stone" and "boulder".
I'm American, but I've spent about a year in Singapore in various stretches. The Acrolectic Singlish/Standard English that my coworkers at a multinational spoke definitely converges with General American English, and I understood it without hesitation. But the basilectic variety spoken, say, between army buddies? About as comprehensible to me as Dutch.
I'm American, but I've spent about a year in Singapore in various stretches. The Acrolectic Singlish/Standard English that my coworkers at a multinational spoke definitely converges with General American English, and I understood it without hesitation. But the basilectic variety spoken, say, between army buddies? About as comprehensible to me as Dutch.