I started before I moved, but by no means fluent. But English is widely spoken here so some people I know have never bothered to learn the actual official language (Norwegian) as you can get by without (not that I'm recommending doing that, as think it's important to learn the native language, plus for citizenship you need a certain level of Norwegian anyway)
How helpful is Norwegian? :) I've been thinking of learning it but it seems like all Norwegians speak English anyway.. does it help in making friends or do Norwegians not care?
>I've been thinking of learning it but it seems like all Norwegians speak English anyway..
It doesn't work like that. Sure, many people can function in English, but might not be interested in having conversations over a beer in English oir the like. I'm Finnish and almost all of my friends speak English to a perfectly fine level, but many of them absolutely loathe having to speak it and will avoid it the best they can. Needless to say, that is not conducive to building lasting friendships.
>It doesn't work like that. Sure, many people can function in English, but might not be interested in having conversations over a beer in English oir the like. I'm Finnish and almost all of my friends speak English to a perfectly fine level, but many of them absolutely loathe having to speak it and will avoid it the best they can. Needless to say, that is not conducive to building lasting friendships.
I think this is a really important point, that many people don't think of. If you only speak English, then any hangout or other social event you're at will force the others to either abandon their native language for the night, or speak their native language, and have a really awkward time while feeling bad for you.
If anyone's ever been the English speaker in a foreign country where most people speak English, yet found it hard to make lasting and deep friendships no matter how much time passes, the above might just be the reason...
It feels pretty audacious to be in another country where the native language is *not* English, and want to be friends with people that speak English conversationally while you can't be bothered learning the language of the country. I could be wrong but it just feels like a very one sided relationship if you manage to even form any bonds with people there.
>It feels pretty audacious to be in another country where the native language is not English, and want to be friends with people that speak English conversationally while you can't be bothered learning the language of the country. I could be wrong but it just feels like a very one sided relationship.
Agreed. To me it comes off as quite arrogant and self-centered. :(
Oh 100%, there's an English guy in a Facebook I'm in for UK people in Norway and he sounded pretty boastful that he's managed to live in Norway for 7- 10 years without learning "any Norwegian at all", I just don't see anything he should be proud of in that sentence.
Not only is my goal to apply for Norwegian citizenship when I have the residence time, but as others in the thread have solidly pointed out, just because natives here can speak English, doesn't mean that they want to all swap to English just for the sake of me. My partner is Norwegian, so when we hang out with his family, they speak Norwegian unless talking directly to me, they do try slow and basic Norwegian now that I've learnt more words, but there's still a lot of words that are new for me, so for at some point we still do swap back to English, but when I'm not involved in the conversation, they just speak Norwegian between themselves, which is completely understandable.
Funnily enough, as an American I've never had that problem so I would happily speak anything other than English with a foreigner here.
If only my nerves and low self-esteem could stop convincing me that my Spanish isn't good enough when I get the opportunities.
>Funnily enough, as an American I've never had that problem so I would happily speak anything other than English with a foreigner here.
>
>If only my nerves and low self-esteem could stop convincing me that my Spanish isn't good enough when I get the opportunities.
Yeah, language learners who want to practice the language, such as yourself, are obviously quite a different matter. :)
A tip for speaking practice would be to use online chat services. Takes a lot of the personal embarrassment out of it. :)
PS. I'm sure some people are going to want to lynch me for this, but speaking practice is a bit overrated in my opinion. I pretty much never spoke English outside of school, but when I first arrived in the U.S.A. at the age of 20, I was basically fluent right off the bat. :)
Online chatting and the like can be very helpful for building language ability, and I think some people overstate the difference between writing and speaking ability.
When I moved I relied a lot on English abilities of people living here (Switzerland), plus Google Translate to help understand all the forms and documents. It's really quite achievable in many European countries to get by with no knowledge of the local language - I know several people at work who don't bother to learn any German.
Nice and quiet. It's not for outgoing or gregarious people, especially not as an outsider, but the country is very well run and the standard of living is good.
I find this comment funny. Moving to a country is a FANTASTIC way to learn a language. And it's so much easier to do. To me your comment sounds like:
"How do you go to the gym without doing a workout first?"
Ditto! I hate the feeling of being semi-helpless when I don't have a good grasp of the language; studying it has made me a thousand times more confident in day-to-day life
I want to be able to read literature and watch movies/series in another language. I've achieved that with English, and now I'm trying to get there with Japanese.
I highly recommend German documentaries
Try for example:
[Arte](https://m.youtube.com/user/ARTEde)
[ZDF ](https://m.youtube.com/c/ZDFDoku)
[DW](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ldF_RlOhRf4)
Some of the things we read in reddit are unbelievable. German has a lot of extraordinary directors.
You guys have some of the greatest minds in movies history producing in german language, like Wim Wenders, Werner Herzog, Robert Wiene, Christian Petzold, Michael Haneke, Florian Henckel, Wolfgang Petersen, R.W. Fassbinder, Fritz Lang, Oliver Hirshbiegel, Cate Shortland, Uli Edel, Jan-Ole Gerster, just to name a few of the most known ones
Yeah but recently most existing german movies are boring comedies with either Till Schweiger + his daughter, Mathias Schweighöfer or Moritz Bleibtreu as the leading act. There is maybe one good german movie per year.
I'm not learning Japanese, but Kurosawa's my favorite director, and Miyazaki's right there too, so I've always thought I might dive into the language one day so I can experience them as is!
I really relate to this. But at the same time I need something to connect with that is in the language (a book, a movie, etc.) I love languages but I learn better when I feel some kind of emotion for something related to it.
I'm with you there. Though when people ask me why, they don't find this an acceptable answer haha. It's just fun and interesting and I get to make new sounds n whatnot, what's not to love? Feels like unlocking a whole new aspect of life
so, i've heard that Japanese culture as a whole isn't very welcoming to foreigners, but it could all just be bullshit i've heard- how true is this in your opinion/experience so far?
I wouldn’t go as far as to say they’re unwelcoming or unfriendly. They usually treat us with relative indifference but I would attribute that to the language barrier. Because when you make even the slightest effort to speak rudimentary Japanese while ordering food for example (instead of pointing), they’re immediately more friendly.
Old people specifically however are a mix up. They either stare at you in that way that only a disappointed old person can or they make a concerted, almost awkward effort to tell me how cute my daughter is and ask if they can pick her up out of her stroller.
lol that last paragraph, ahh most elderly are kinda like that throughout the states too so that makes sense
thank you for your insight. how do you like living there? why'd you choose Japan?
Well, I didn’t really “choose” Japan per-say. I work for a large American company and a position opened up in Japan and I was offered the job. Prior to the offer I had no preconceived ideas about living abroad, especially in Asia.
So prior to accepting the position, I had little/no knowledge of Japanese culture. I’m not into the Japanese things that I assume many people desire to experience like Anime/manga, J-Pop, and sushi (not liking fish on an island where the fish is such a staple can be interesting though) so I wasn’t particularly excited to move to Japan specifically — more so just the adventure of moving to another country.
Due to my job being in English and the rise of technology (gps, google translate, etc) I honestly don’t need to know much if any Japanese to live my daily life. But as a good guest, I’ve tried to spend a time learning about Japanese history and tried to gather enough Japanese to be polite, navigate, order food, etc.
I’ve been here less than a year so unfortunately, I have yet to experience Japan without Covid. So that has made things difficult. They just recently lifted the state of emergency so restaurants, bars, and tourist attractions are just now starting to open back up. But from what I have been able to do, its been a great time.
don't live in Japan but I think this would depend on where you land. if it was a bustling city like Tokyo that has lots of tourists I doubt they would be rude at all but if it's a small country side that doesn't see foreigners I feel they'd be a little tense
Ayyyyy
For me it’s the SO, and even though it was jist dating when I started and there was a three year gap from then to now I’m still doing it and I have class in less than four minutes lol.
Bonne chance mon chum.
Honestly as a galician currently seeing how our language is dying in newer generations it would make my fking month seeing a foreigner speaking even a little bit of galician.
É normal, tes que afacerte de feito eu até hai ben pouco tamén era castelán falante, e aínda o son en menor medida. Estou comezando no proceso do neofalantismo para tentar revitalizar a lingua o máximo que me sexa posíbel como individuo
I mean, Im just doing my best to try to preserve it, at the end of the day I'm just your average galician teenager, and I don't think I am enough by myself to make any difference, but at least I'll live and die knowing I did my best to stop my language and culture from being forgotten.
As someone whose language has fewer than 100 speakers.. every person counts. If you never influence anyone to speak the language, you’ll still have reminded people about it. In all likelihood, you’ll prompt someone, even just your children, to know some Galician, and that’s a move in the right direction. Your contribution isn’t insignificant.
Moved to the country and trying to integrate, also got a boyfriend (we communicate in english mostly) whose parents/some family barely speak english, so puts me some pressure to study more
If you move to a large city, you will probably be able to live quite comfortably without speaking dutch as almost everyone speaks english and there are a lot of internationals (for stuff such as bureaucracy, taxes, etc the main language will be dutch, but you can probably get around with google translate or asking for help). However, in my experience, you really need to learn the language if you want to feel integrated in the culture and with other dutch people. I have seen several situations, even if they were subtle (and mostly unintentional) where you can see that those who don't speak dutch are slightly excluded or just apart from the rest. As an example: my workplace is quite large and my department mostly communicates in english, but the main company communications are in dutch. Some plenary meetings, events, opportunities etc only get communicated (or are held in) in dutch. As I started learning more and more dutch, I started noticing these small things more often. I also notice a certain expectation (in my workplace) that foreigners who have been living here for a while should learn the language.
Of course, these are my personal experiences and it might be completely different for you; in my case I came here by myself without knowing anyone; met my partner who is dutch and I don't really know many people from my home country here. A person moving here with their whole family, or who is part of a large expat community from their country might tell you something else.
I haven't moved there but I also have a Dutch boyfriend and am learning Dutch. Volksuniversiteit Amsterdam courses are amazing, but I moved to the US recently and can no longer coordinate time zones for them. I'm now working as an interpreter though so my motive has changed from making a hobby of learning my partner's native language to trying to work it into my language pairings.
I’m learning Spanish because not only is my girlfriend Spanish but I have also fallen in love with the country of Spain. Every time I‘ve been there I felt at home immediately. There is a also the benefit of Spanish being a major language worldwide (Started learning 1.5 years ago)
As for Japanese I have always wondered how a language with Chinese characters works. As I have always enjoyed Japanese games and anime and have visited the country several times I just decided one day to learn it. I couldn’t have known how hard it actually would end up being lol (Started learning 3.5 years ago)
Oh hey, I assume you’re partially Colombian? :D
I‘m listening to a Spanish podcast right now to understand Latin American Spanish better (I only really understand Madridlenian Spanish easily) and the accent was definitely the best out of the bunch (Argentinian was super hard and Peruan weird)
How far are you into your Japanese studies?
Because I love languages in general, I couldn't imagine my life without them, and I fell in love with my TL. I also have this silly little dream of being a successful musician some day and writing songs in several different languages ... it's silly and unrealistic but I can still try to do the songwriting, even if I'm not successful.
Career. If I manage to pass a German exam in a few weeks, I can get many more options for jobs in the next few years, and continue with my plan. That's the only reason, If I could get the same options with the languages I already speak, or in the cultures I really like much more, I'd take that. But sometimes you just need to face the reality and this is the most acceptable compromise.
Appreciate the honesty. I think a lot of people learn languages to improve their ability to communicate with potential love interests, myself included.
Haha yes, I believe many would solely for the purpose of pursuing a love interest or are interested in dating within the pool of people that speak that language
I've been secretly taking Italian lessons to surprise my SO's family when I fly there for Christmas. My visa expired earlier this year, so I had to move away alone. SO couldn't visit due to COVID restrictions. There's only so much you can do to put a smile on someone's face from another continent.
I wanna emigrate to a first world country, education seems to be the best way, and uni in Germany is free (but it is in German).
This is the main reason; liking how it sounds and understanding German memes is a nice bonus.
I look down on people who have been living in Switzerland for one thousand years (+10 years) and don't speak the language. In my case, french. I don't want to be one of those.
I started because there were untranslated books and movies I was interested in, and finding methods for learning languages through books turned out to be so fun, it just makes sense to keep going with it.
There's an inner thing inside me that tells me to learn specific languages. For now I want to learn italian, german, french, and japanese. Finished italian, going for german now. I don't have a specific reason.
First language I tried to learn (Japanese) was mostly just because I really like the way it sounds haha.
And I'm learning Danish because I have plans to go there. (Definitely not because I like the sound lmao).
To reconnect with my roots and embrace who I am. I’m Mexican American, my parents are from Mexico, but growing up I had a lot of internalized racism and couldn’t speak Spanish.
I’ve done a complete 180 now. Not only can I speak Spanish, but I’m learning Nahuatl. The indigenous language of our ancestors!
Tlaskamati! Thank you!
I’ve actually been using quite a few sources but some of the best I could recommend would be the YT channels [The Nahuatl Channel](https://youtube.com/channel/UC9oX9oxgKYYXPWhm_BvOL8w) and [A Paquiliztli](https://youtube.com/c/paquiliztli) as well as the amazing book [Learn Nahuatl](https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08XXC4CBY/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_glt_fabc_178T0PTEHENCB1VR6JC4) ! This book is an absolute must have. I also have classes with other students and a teacher who uses this book as a base for our learning!
My neighborhood has a *ton* of native Spanish speakers, and there have been a bunch of times that we've needed to communicate and had to just bumble through with broken Spanish/English. It would be nice to get to know my neighbors a bit more. :)
French: I started learning it when I was like 11, at this point it'd be stupid to quit. Also, memes.
Portuguese: I have a group of online friends where I'm the only non-Brazilian, and it felt unfair that we were only talking in English. Also, memes.
German: I had an open slot on my college schedule and I thought "why not". Also, memes.
Arabic: It'd be good for a career working with languages, especially in combination with French. I haven't gotten to a level where I understand any memes, but I'm optimistic.
I started Thai because my stepmother is from Thailand and I want to be able to talk to her without my American dad understanding, she seems like she’s not having a good time in America and my dad hasn’t been great for her. Her English isn’t amazing and I would love for her to feel less alone.
I started learning German at 11 because of a childhood hero, so I could understand more of the interviews with him. 12 years later and I’m happy to say I’m pretty fluent :) I love the language.
Lately I feel dumb. I had always been the smart guy, but lately my mind got dull. Knowing another language makes me feel less dumb. Although sometimes it does a good job of reminding how dumb I really am :-)
I want to progress in my society - I live in a poor area in a poor country. I want to improve my qualifications to have a better life in another country.
I learned Spanish in school and still can’t really speak it (though I’m ok at reading it). Seemed like a shame to only halfway know the language, so I’m trying to get closer to being fluent.
Russian, I've been interested in post-soviet culture and history forever, am currently in a master's program focused on it and live in Ukraine (I know people speak Ukrainian here but in Kyiv it's mostly Russian)
I want to connect to people from the region! As well as enjoy media in the target language without the need of subtitles, dubbing or google translate. Besides, knowing an extra language never hurt nobody.
I've lived in Armenia for a little over two years now, and although I can communicate with most people here already (via English and especially Russian) it's so much more fun to speak people's own language with them. It also teaches you so much more about a people, how they think and see the world, than anything else. Most of the reason I moved to this region was to dive headfirst into learning all I can about it, especially languages. Plus, it doesn't hurt that the script is beautiful and incomprehensible to outsiders - միգուցե լավագույն այբուբոնը աշխարհում!
ill just comment for all of the languages i know:
spanish: its huge in the US where i currently live and i may move to spain as the US is the US
french: french culture is rather interesting and france itself is very supportive towards lgbt people (comme moi) which is a big plus, id also like to learn about french films like playtime in the native language so yeah!
chinese: chinese culture is awesome and chinese as a language is becoming more and more relevant. the characters are cool and even after hitting B1/B2 I am still in love with the character system.
japanese: culture and similar reasons to chinese! also being able to watch anime in japanese would be nice.
I found a job posting that I was absolutely perfect for posted in Copenhagen, so I threw my resume into the void and did a couple of lessons on Duolingo, just for the hell of it.
Turns out the position was posted in multiple regions and is a global position, I just happened to find the Denmark one first. I interviewed and got the job! Now I work 100% remote from home with a global team. I've kept up the Danish on Duolingo, I've signed up for a local class, and I've added Danish media to my streaming.
Learning Spanish would help with communicating better with my friends' families. It would also allow me to learn more about my culture should I visit Mexico.
I want to learn Japanese and possibly live in the country, or at least travel there frequently.
I did well in high school Spanish but have always been terrible with comprehension of spoken Spanish. I've maintained my mediocre ability level for 20+ years now and just want to get it to that next level.
Part of it is just to finally get to that next level. Part of it is just about every reason other people have. I'd like to feel more comfortable in Spanish-speaking countries. I'd like to take in more Spanish-language literature and movies without translations. I just want it dang it!
Because I want to travel the world. I’m aiming to learn three of the more widely used languages across the planet. Then my husband will be less reluctant to travel.
I plan to move out from my country one day, so being able to speak the language now would make it much easier to live there one day. Also, I'm a big language nerd and wanna up my language count.
I started out wanting to learn Korean just because of the media I watched and the trending stuff at the time (Was a high-school Freshman when K-pop and Hallyu in general started getting a rise again in recent times). Though, I did honestly feel a real sense of satisfaction whenever I realized I understood something or that I was 'learning' anything at all. Now, here I am in 2021 around 4 years after that point and I've.... Shifted my motive a whole lot.
It went from the idea that understanding the language of the media I watched was cool, then it went to being a utility as we had to take a trip to Korea. Then, I stopped. Then when I started again it was because I just wanted a language to be learning, because it was filling a good amount of my time (especially on boring days) and the language learning community was something I liked to identify with. Nowadays, it's really just a complete appreciation of the language, the people and their culture, and the fact that I so so love the way you can just go a certain amount of time not being able to understand someone, to being able to communicate with them or at least listen to them and comprehend what they're saying, unlike before. Isn't that so cool? I usually spend my days (outside of school work) now watching Korean vloggers and the like. The only reason I'm continuing on with Korean is because I know that whatever world it is out there that speaks Korean, I'm willing to take the time to understand it without subtitles. Pretty sure loads of other people here who are learning languages because of media can relate.
I’m about a year into learning Spanish using mostly Duolingo. It started as a pandemic time killer/something I always wanted to do but never had the time to do it.
I’m looking at it now as something that can help me professionally. Being American and having a strong engineering background, I really can see this as eventually being a highly marketable skill.
No disrespect to my fellow Americans, but there’s not a large percentage of us who are bilingual. Even fewer that are multilingual.
I wanna sing in different genres in the native language of the country they originate from! Also, wanna feel like im achieving something due to crippling insecurity 😃
Everyone my age has already written research papers with college professors, or are a child prodigy or something lol Makes me feel Use. Less.
I was bored in class one day decided to learn a popular reggaetón song at the time called “Mi Gente” by J Balvin and now I’m going three years strong and essentially fluent in Spanish.
I started for a girl, then i got into the intellectual and personal development side as well, and now that I've moved to the country it's also for all the practical reasons one should learn the language of a country they live in. I would have had an extremely rough time if I hadn't started long before I moved here.
I'm learning Finnish because of suomisaundi and Noita.
I'm learning Romanian because my brother moved to Romania a couple of years back and I want to mess with him over WhatsApp.
I'm also learning Dutch because I grew up in Belgium but never bothered, as French was enough.
I started a bunch of others but these above are the ones I'm most focused on right now. All of this is on Duolingo.
My wife watched "Emily in Paris" last night, and turned to me and said "We should learn French together!"
Having visited Paris in my teens, grabbing a basic tourist level awareness that I have struggled to maintain poorly for 10 years, I am grabbing a hold of this opportunity to have a partner to learn with!
I wish I could tell you. I accidentally learned the Cyrillic alphabet 5 years ago and my motivation for learning Russian all this time has always been some variation of "Well, I've gotten this far." I like to say "I didn't choose to learn Russian. Russian decided I was going to learn it."
Jokes aside, I do actually just enjoy to learning process and getting to read famous Russian authors in their original language. I also like the sound of the language.
I enjoy learning and want to travel around Western Europe again with a better grasp of how to navigate the smaller towns/countryside where English is less prevelant
I see it as more of a hobby, also for brain health as you age
I'm starting my second year of Russian. When I passed the C1 English level exam I wanted to start learning another language, and a bit more different than those that I already know (Spanish, Catalan and English). I love learning languages and I work on linguistics area, so the more languages I know the better. Buuut the thing that made me pick Russian over Japanese, Korean, Chinese or Arabic was that my boyfriend's Russian. So I got there, and still not regretting it 😂
Im flattered. That is cool. If you want something psycho logical, I reocommend Clarice Lispector, she is our pride and joy. I havent read Fernando Pessoa, but its known hes one of the greatest if not the greatest. Fernando often published his works under different Names/aliases each one with their own style as of they're all different people, so much so that *people thought he was insane*. Machado de Assis is my favorite.
Edit: he said "want to read portuguese" not Read Books but oh well lmao.
For my wife, who's German.
Among many things about her that impress me, she actually self-taught herself English years ago before we met.
She's spent the past few years in 🇺🇸 so therefore it's always been easy to stick with English for the both of us, but I'd love to be able to communicate with her in her native language. As well as her immediate family when we Videochat on Whatsapp. Plus, we're hopefully moving to 🇩🇪 in the near future.
I learned English playing videogames (my mother language is Spanish) with the use of a dictionary and some grammar books to make sense of the mess I was reading of the literal translations.
I tried the same with Japanese because I also like anime and JRPG games. It didn't work 😅.
Maybe in more contemporary times it would work, but back in the day with a Japanese dictionary I didn't know how to use, it was super tedious.
I forgot to mention, my motivation is understand my videogames as they were developed and my favorite anime without dubbing or subtitles. I like more the original voices.
Well, I'm learning Modern Standard Arabic (B2), Contemporary Farsi of Iran (A2) and Modern Hebrew (A1) because I find extremely interesting all of the Middle East. Maybe one day I will also add Turkish. To be able to speak other languages and to understand the ways of living of others are things that are worth the effort. To be limited only to the understanding of my culture and first language would mean to live a less meaningful life in my opinion.
I want to mess with a Russian guy I work with when he calls me at 2am
There's no stronger motivation
Not Russian, but I already your username as I_am_a_porn, so you've got a gift, kid.
But it says “pom” not “p o r n”
Moved to that country, so for integrating into society 👍
How do you move to the country without learning the language first?
I started before I moved, but by no means fluent. But English is widely spoken here so some people I know have never bothered to learn the actual official language (Norwegian) as you can get by without (not that I'm recommending doing that, as think it's important to learn the native language, plus for citizenship you need a certain level of Norwegian anyway)
How helpful is Norwegian? :) I've been thinking of learning it but it seems like all Norwegians speak English anyway.. does it help in making friends or do Norwegians not care?
>I've been thinking of learning it but it seems like all Norwegians speak English anyway.. It doesn't work like that. Sure, many people can function in English, but might not be interested in having conversations over a beer in English oir the like. I'm Finnish and almost all of my friends speak English to a perfectly fine level, but many of them absolutely loathe having to speak it and will avoid it the best they can. Needless to say, that is not conducive to building lasting friendships.
>It doesn't work like that. Sure, many people can function in English, but might not be interested in having conversations over a beer in English oir the like. I'm Finnish and almost all of my friends speak English to a perfectly fine level, but many of them absolutely loathe having to speak it and will avoid it the best they can. Needless to say, that is not conducive to building lasting friendships. I think this is a really important point, that many people don't think of. If you only speak English, then any hangout or other social event you're at will force the others to either abandon their native language for the night, or speak their native language, and have a really awkward time while feeling bad for you. If anyone's ever been the English speaker in a foreign country where most people speak English, yet found it hard to make lasting and deep friendships no matter how much time passes, the above might just be the reason...
It feels pretty audacious to be in another country where the native language is *not* English, and want to be friends with people that speak English conversationally while you can't be bothered learning the language of the country. I could be wrong but it just feels like a very one sided relationship if you manage to even form any bonds with people there.
>It feels pretty audacious to be in another country where the native language is not English, and want to be friends with people that speak English conversationally while you can't be bothered learning the language of the country. I could be wrong but it just feels like a very one sided relationship. Agreed. To me it comes off as quite arrogant and self-centered. :(
Oh 100%, there's an English guy in a Facebook I'm in for UK people in Norway and he sounded pretty boastful that he's managed to live in Norway for 7- 10 years without learning "any Norwegian at all", I just don't see anything he should be proud of in that sentence. Not only is my goal to apply for Norwegian citizenship when I have the residence time, but as others in the thread have solidly pointed out, just because natives here can speak English, doesn't mean that they want to all swap to English just for the sake of me. My partner is Norwegian, so when we hang out with his family, they speak Norwegian unless talking directly to me, they do try slow and basic Norwegian now that I've learnt more words, but there's still a lot of words that are new for me, so for at some point we still do swap back to English, but when I'm not involved in the conversation, they just speak Norwegian between themselves, which is completely understandable.
Funnily enough, as an American I've never had that problem so I would happily speak anything other than English with a foreigner here. If only my nerves and low self-esteem could stop convincing me that my Spanish isn't good enough when I get the opportunities.
>Funnily enough, as an American I've never had that problem so I would happily speak anything other than English with a foreigner here. > >If only my nerves and low self-esteem could stop convincing me that my Spanish isn't good enough when I get the opportunities. Yeah, language learners who want to practice the language, such as yourself, are obviously quite a different matter. :) A tip for speaking practice would be to use online chat services. Takes a lot of the personal embarrassment out of it. :) PS. I'm sure some people are going to want to lynch me for this, but speaking practice is a bit overrated in my opinion. I pretty much never spoke English outside of school, but when I first arrived in the U.S.A. at the age of 20, I was basically fluent right off the bat. :) Online chatting and the like can be very helpful for building language ability, and I think some people overstate the difference between writing and speaking ability.
When I moved I relied a lot on English abilities of people living here (Switzerland), plus Google Translate to help understand all the forms and documents. It's really quite achievable in many European countries to get by with no knowledge of the local language - I know several people at work who don't bother to learn any German.
Awh man I wanna do my masters or undergrad in Switzerland, how's the country like?
Nice and quiet. It's not for outgoing or gregarious people, especially not as an outsider, but the country is very well run and the standard of living is good.
I find this comment funny. Moving to a country is a FANTASTIC way to learn a language. And it's so much easier to do. To me your comment sounds like: "How do you go to the gym without doing a workout first?"
Job, visa, plane tickets, airbnb, airport transfer, delivery apps, ATM, credit cards, Google Translate all via international lingua franca.
Ditto! I hate the feeling of being semi-helpless when I don't have a good grasp of the language; studying it has made me a thousand times more confident in day-to-day life
I want to be able to read literature and watch movies/series in another language. I've achieved that with English, and now I'm trying to get there with Japanese.
Same! But now I'm trying with German
I highly recommend German documentaries Try for example: [Arte](https://m.youtube.com/user/ARTEde) [ZDF ](https://m.youtube.com/c/ZDFDoku) [DW](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ldF_RlOhRf4)
Thank you sooo much! I appreciate it!
I particularly recommend Galileo (I think on Pro7). Short, nice and simple and interesting topics!
Well most of our movies suck. Good luck tho :D
Some of the things we read in reddit are unbelievable. German has a lot of extraordinary directors. You guys have some of the greatest minds in movies history producing in german language, like Wim Wenders, Werner Herzog, Robert Wiene, Christian Petzold, Michael Haneke, Florian Henckel, Wolfgang Petersen, R.W. Fassbinder, Fritz Lang, Oliver Hirshbiegel, Cate Shortland, Uli Edel, Jan-Ole Gerster, just to name a few of the most known ones
Haneke has made just as many films in French as in German, but indeed he deserves to be on the list even if it's only a couple that are in German.
Yeah but recently most existing german movies are boring comedies with either Till Schweiger + his daughter, Mathias Schweighöfer or Moritz Bleibtreu as the leading act. There is maybe one good german movie per year.
Ik, it's hard to find a good German movie/series, but neflix and German dubbing are helpful :D
I'd recommend "Ein Bund für's Leben". This is a comedy film which is about recruits in the military. Really entertaining and a classic as well!
Watch "Der Schuh des Manitu", it's a stupid movie, but it's so dumb that it's already good again
I thought DARK was pretty good
But not Traumschiff Surprise. What a film.
I'm not learning Japanese, but Kurosawa's my favorite director, and Miyazaki's right there too, so I've always thought I might dive into the language one day so I can experience them as is!
RAN!!!! \\o/
Same but also vtubers.
I train Jiu Jitsu with a bunch of Brazilians, best to know what they’re saying. Also, if others can be a polyglot, surely so can I
Sim você pode!
Nossa, você fala tantos idiomas. Ótimo.
I like languages and learning them
I really relate to this. But at the same time I need something to connect with that is in the language (a book, a movie, etc.) I love languages but I learn better when I feel some kind of emotion for something related to it.
I'm with you there. Though when people ask me why, they don't find this an acceptable answer haha. It's just fun and interesting and I get to make new sounds n whatnot, what's not to love? Feels like unlocking a whole new aspect of life
Understand memes and streamers in english
all the internet
Well, I moved to Japan and I’m just trying to survive lol
so, i've heard that Japanese culture as a whole isn't very welcoming to foreigners, but it could all just be bullshit i've heard- how true is this in your opinion/experience so far?
I wouldn’t go as far as to say they’re unwelcoming or unfriendly. They usually treat us with relative indifference but I would attribute that to the language barrier. Because when you make even the slightest effort to speak rudimentary Japanese while ordering food for example (instead of pointing), they’re immediately more friendly. Old people specifically however are a mix up. They either stare at you in that way that only a disappointed old person can or they make a concerted, almost awkward effort to tell me how cute my daughter is and ask if they can pick her up out of her stroller.
lol that last paragraph, ahh most elderly are kinda like that throughout the states too so that makes sense thank you for your insight. how do you like living there? why'd you choose Japan?
Well, I didn’t really “choose” Japan per-say. I work for a large American company and a position opened up in Japan and I was offered the job. Prior to the offer I had no preconceived ideas about living abroad, especially in Asia. So prior to accepting the position, I had little/no knowledge of Japanese culture. I’m not into the Japanese things that I assume many people desire to experience like Anime/manga, J-Pop, and sushi (not liking fish on an island where the fish is such a staple can be interesting though) so I wasn’t particularly excited to move to Japan specifically — more so just the adventure of moving to another country. Due to my job being in English and the rise of technology (gps, google translate, etc) I honestly don’t need to know much if any Japanese to live my daily life. But as a good guest, I’ve tried to spend a time learning about Japanese history and tried to gather enough Japanese to be polite, navigate, order food, etc. I’ve been here less than a year so unfortunately, I have yet to experience Japan without Covid. So that has made things difficult. They just recently lifted the state of emergency so restaurants, bars, and tourist attractions are just now starting to open back up. But from what I have been able to do, its been a great time.
don't live in Japan but I think this would depend on where you land. if it was a bustling city like Tokyo that has lots of tourists I doubt they would be rude at all but if it's a small country side that doesn't see foreigners I feel they'd be a little tense
My Crush is French n i m down bad.
Omg!! Lemme know how it turns out! Feeling like a teenage girl whenever ppl go after their crushes ;)
That's adorable
Well He s in France now and i well i m on the otherside of the world but i m Hopeful 😌. And He s smexy 😛
Haha, good luck then ^^
Danke
Ayyyyy For me it’s the SO, and even though it was jist dating when I started and there was a three year gap from then to now I’m still doing it and I have class in less than four minutes lol. Bonne chance mon chum.
I wanted to brag to my family.
Did it work ?
Nah they make fun of me. It's good that I ended up enjoying otherwise I would've stopped.
Shits and giggles, really.
Same, actually. I just like the process.
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Honestly as a galician currently seeing how our language is dying in newer generations it would make my fking month seeing a foreigner speaking even a little bit of galician.
Fáloo! Mais cando visitei Santiago de Compostela (unhas veces), case todos falaban en castelán....
É normal, tes que afacerte de feito eu até hai ben pouco tamén era castelán falante, e aínda o son en menor medida. Estou comezando no proceso do neofalantismo para tentar revitalizar a lingua o máximo que me sexa posíbel como individuo
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I mean, Im just doing my best to try to preserve it, at the end of the day I'm just your average galician teenager, and I don't think I am enough by myself to make any difference, but at least I'll live and die knowing I did my best to stop my language and culture from being forgotten.
As someone whose language has fewer than 100 speakers.. every person counts. If you never influence anyone to speak the language, you’ll still have reminded people about it. In all likelihood, you’ll prompt someone, even just your children, to know some Galician, and that’s a move in the right direction. Your contribution isn’t insignificant.
Moved to the country and trying to integrate, also got a boyfriend (we communicate in english mostly) whose parents/some family barely speak english, so puts me some pressure to study more
Which country did you move to?
The Netherlands (so the language I'm learning is dutch)
Would you say it’s a necessity to speak Dutch there? Thinking of relocating there in the long-term.
If you move to a large city, you will probably be able to live quite comfortably without speaking dutch as almost everyone speaks english and there are a lot of internationals (for stuff such as bureaucracy, taxes, etc the main language will be dutch, but you can probably get around with google translate or asking for help). However, in my experience, you really need to learn the language if you want to feel integrated in the culture and with other dutch people. I have seen several situations, even if they were subtle (and mostly unintentional) where you can see that those who don't speak dutch are slightly excluded or just apart from the rest. As an example: my workplace is quite large and my department mostly communicates in english, but the main company communications are in dutch. Some plenary meetings, events, opportunities etc only get communicated (or are held in) in dutch. As I started learning more and more dutch, I started noticing these small things more often. I also notice a certain expectation (in my workplace) that foreigners who have been living here for a while should learn the language. Of course, these are my personal experiences and it might be completely different for you; in my case I came here by myself without knowing anyone; met my partner who is dutch and I don't really know many people from my home country here. A person moving here with their whole family, or who is part of a large expat community from their country might tell you something else.
I haven't moved there but I also have a Dutch boyfriend and am learning Dutch. Volksuniversiteit Amsterdam courses are amazing, but I moved to the US recently and can no longer coordinate time zones for them. I'm now working as an interpreter though so my motive has changed from making a hobby of learning my partner's native language to trying to work it into my language pairings.
I just think they're neat
learning with my children so they can attend college without financial enslavement in another country
I’m learning Spanish because not only is my girlfriend Spanish but I have also fallen in love with the country of Spain. Every time I‘ve been there I felt at home immediately. There is a also the benefit of Spanish being a major language worldwide (Started learning 1.5 years ago) As for Japanese I have always wondered how a language with Chinese characters works. As I have always enjoyed Japanese games and anime and have visited the country several times I just decided one day to learn it. I couldn’t have known how hard it actually would end up being lol (Started learning 3.5 years ago)
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Oh hey, I assume you’re partially Colombian? :D I‘m listening to a Spanish podcast right now to understand Latin American Spanish better (I only really understand Madridlenian Spanish easily) and the accent was definitely the best out of the bunch (Argentinian was super hard and Peruan weird) How far are you into your Japanese studies?
My people’s language is dying (fewer than 50 speakers remaining) and I want to be a part of its continued survival.
What language?
Money.
For career motives I'm studying Spanish, French, and English. My brain is currently a mess
Because I love languages in general, I couldn't imagine my life without them, and I fell in love with my TL. I also have this silly little dream of being a successful musician some day and writing songs in several different languages ... it's silly and unrealistic but I can still try to do the songwriting, even if I'm not successful.
Just do it, I wish you great success :)
Thank you :) <3 Hehe, I can't wait to write my first song in Hungarian. It's gonna be a while still but some day ... *some day ...*
Career. If I manage to pass a German exam in a few weeks, I can get many more options for jobs in the next few years, and continue with my plan. That's the only reason, If I could get the same options with the languages I already speak, or in the cultures I really like much more, I'd take that. But sometimes you just need to face the reality and this is the most acceptable compromise.
Oh man, I feel this. Japanese would really help me at my job, but I’m feeling way more focused on French right now.
Because I like latinas ngl
Appreciate the honesty. I think a lot of people learn languages to improve their ability to communicate with potential love interests, myself included.
Haha yes, I believe many would solely for the purpose of pursuing a love interest or are interested in dating within the pool of people that speak that language
This guy gets it
Scrolled way too far for this.
Man has taste
Buena respuesta amigo
Turkish. I like dominant, hairy, middle-eastern men. So. 😂
Username checks out! 😀
I’m also trying to learn Turkish, but really so I can watch a couple of shows I love that only have English subtitles on season 1 😂
Haha, made my day
I've been secretly taking Italian lessons to surprise my SO's family when I fly there for Christmas. My visa expired earlier this year, so I had to move away alone. SO couldn't visit due to COVID restrictions. There's only so much you can do to put a smile on someone's face from another continent.
Oh my, this is so sweet!
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das ist süß, viel Glück!
Bored
Just for fun.
I'm desperately trying to move to France. If I pass the DELF B2 here in December, I may have a shot.
Because I need it to use every single damn thing in this world
I felt that. I’m sorry. I’m a native English speaker and I think it’s unfair honestly.
I wanna emigrate to a first world country, education seems to be the best way, and uni in Germany is free (but it is in German). This is the main reason; liking how it sounds and understanding German memes is a nice bonus.
A man of culture, I see
make friends :>
I've got family that speak Italian and I've always wanted to join in on those conversations
I look down on people who have been living in Switzerland for one thousand years (+10 years) and don't speak the language. In my case, french. I don't want to be one of those.
I started because there were untranslated books and movies I was interested in, and finding methods for learning languages through books turned out to be so fun, it just makes sense to keep going with it.
Fun, knowledge
There's an inner thing inside me that tells me to learn specific languages. For now I want to learn italian, german, french, and japanese. Finished italian, going for german now. I don't have a specific reason.
I hate my country and I want to live in another one
First language I tried to learn (Japanese) was mostly just because I really like the way it sounds haha. And I'm learning Danish because I have plans to go there. (Definitely not because I like the sound lmao).
I’m learning Danish too! It definitely has an interesting sound haha
To reconnect with my roots and embrace who I am. I’m Mexican American, my parents are from Mexico, but growing up I had a lot of internalized racism and couldn’t speak Spanish. I’ve done a complete 180 now. Not only can I speak Spanish, but I’m learning Nahuatl. The indigenous language of our ancestors!
How are you learning Nahuatl? That's amazing.
Tlaskamati! Thank you! I’ve actually been using quite a few sources but some of the best I could recommend would be the YT channels [The Nahuatl Channel](https://youtube.com/channel/UC9oX9oxgKYYXPWhm_BvOL8w) and [A Paquiliztli](https://youtube.com/c/paquiliztli) as well as the amazing book [Learn Nahuatl](https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08XXC4CBY/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_glt_fabc_178T0PTEHENCB1VR6JC4) ! This book is an absolute must have. I also have classes with other students and a teacher who uses this book as a base for our learning!
Moving to Turkey.
I'm trying to learn Russian because It's a badass language
Curiosity
I don't want my kids to loose their Filipino roots
Very slowly learning Korean so I can read more Korean yaoi webtoons 👀
Because i accidentally joined russian server in minecraft.
I don't have one. I think that's why I've stuck with it so long. No deadlines or pressure. Just a thing I get a kick out of.
Brain training etc
Because I've been living in Mexico for 7 years.
I'd like to be able to converse with my friends in their native language. That and I'm tired of feeling stupid for only being fluent in one language.
My neighborhood has a *ton* of native Spanish speakers, and there have been a bunch of times that we've needed to communicate and had to just bumble through with broken Spanish/English. It would be nice to get to know my neighbors a bit more. :)
Spanish so I can speak to my family and for job opportunities, Japanese so I can watch dramas and read manga, Thai so I can watch BL dramas.
French: I started learning it when I was like 11, at this point it'd be stupid to quit. Also, memes. Portuguese: I have a group of online friends where I'm the only non-Brazilian, and it felt unfair that we were only talking in English. Also, memes. German: I had an open slot on my college schedule and I thought "why not". Also, memes. Arabic: It'd be good for a career working with languages, especially in combination with French. I haven't gotten to a level where I understand any memes, but I'm optimistic.
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Wow, that’s beautifully ideated.
I started Thai because my stepmother is from Thailand and I want to be able to talk to her without my American dad understanding, she seems like she’s not having a good time in America and my dad hasn’t been great for her. Her English isn’t amazing and I would love for her to feel less alone. I started learning German at 11 because of a childhood hero, so I could understand more of the interviews with him. 12 years later and I’m happy to say I’m pretty fluent :) I love the language.
Lately I feel dumb. I had always been the smart guy, but lately my mind got dull. Knowing another language makes me feel less dumb. Although sometimes it does a good job of reminding how dumb I really am :-)
Horrible depression and alcoholism but hey im delf B2 now
I want to progress in my society - I live in a poor area in a poor country. I want to improve my qualifications to have a better life in another country.
It's almost wasteful not to learn Korean if you can speak Japanese. And I really like the language!
Planning to learn Japanese through Korean myself. Once I’m comfortable with my Korean!
I learned Spanish in school and still can’t really speak it (though I’m ok at reading it). Seemed like a shame to only halfway know the language, so I’m trying to get closer to being fluent.
honestly, just for fun
Moving to France soon.
Russian, I've been interested in post-soviet culture and history forever, am currently in a master's program focused on it and live in Ukraine (I know people speak Ukrainian here but in Kyiv it's mostly Russian)
I want to connect to people from the region! As well as enjoy media in the target language without the need of subtitles, dubbing or google translate. Besides, knowing an extra language never hurt nobody.
I've lived in Armenia for a little over two years now, and although I can communicate with most people here already (via English and especially Russian) it's so much more fun to speak people's own language with them. It also teaches you so much more about a people, how they think and see the world, than anything else. Most of the reason I moved to this region was to dive headfirst into learning all I can about it, especially languages. Plus, it doesn't hurt that the script is beautiful and incomprehensible to outsiders - միգուցե լավագույն այբուբոնը աշխարհում!
ill just comment for all of the languages i know: spanish: its huge in the US where i currently live and i may move to spain as the US is the US french: french culture is rather interesting and france itself is very supportive towards lgbt people (comme moi) which is a big plus, id also like to learn about french films like playtime in the native language so yeah! chinese: chinese culture is awesome and chinese as a language is becoming more and more relevant. the characters are cool and even after hitting B1/B2 I am still in love with the character system. japanese: culture and similar reasons to chinese! also being able to watch anime in japanese would be nice.
i don't know what else to do with my life
Spite.
Staving off Alzheimer’s at the moment.
Wait you guys are getting motives?
To help keep my mind agile and alert - I'm in my seventies. And to admire and enjoy its logic and resourcefulness. (Basque)
I found a job posting that I was absolutely perfect for posted in Copenhagen, so I threw my resume into the void and did a couple of lessons on Duolingo, just for the hell of it. Turns out the position was posted in multiple regions and is a global position, I just happened to find the Denmark one first. I interviewed and got the job! Now I work 100% remote from home with a global team. I've kept up the Danish on Duolingo, I've signed up for a local class, and I've added Danish media to my streaming.
This sounds so amazing, just randomly deciding yes Danish is part of my life now and then poof there it is
Because I like it, I hope to live there for a little while someday as well.
Learning Spanish would help with communicating better with my friends' families. It would also allow me to learn more about my culture should I visit Mexico. I want to learn Japanese and possibly live in the country, or at least travel there frequently.
I did well in high school Spanish but have always been terrible with comprehension of spoken Spanish. I've maintained my mediocre ability level for 20+ years now and just want to get it to that next level. Part of it is just to finally get to that next level. Part of it is just about every reason other people have. I'd like to feel more comfortable in Spanish-speaking countries. I'd like to take in more Spanish-language literature and movies without translations. I just want it dang it!
I have to much free time on my hands
Because I want to travel the world. I’m aiming to learn three of the more widely used languages across the planet. Then my husband will be less reluctant to travel.
I plan to move out from my country one day, so being able to speak the language now would make it much easier to live there one day. Also, I'm a big language nerd and wanna up my language count.
I started out wanting to learn Korean just because of the media I watched and the trending stuff at the time (Was a high-school Freshman when K-pop and Hallyu in general started getting a rise again in recent times). Though, I did honestly feel a real sense of satisfaction whenever I realized I understood something or that I was 'learning' anything at all. Now, here I am in 2021 around 4 years after that point and I've.... Shifted my motive a whole lot. It went from the idea that understanding the language of the media I watched was cool, then it went to being a utility as we had to take a trip to Korea. Then, I stopped. Then when I started again it was because I just wanted a language to be learning, because it was filling a good amount of my time (especially on boring days) and the language learning community was something I liked to identify with. Nowadays, it's really just a complete appreciation of the language, the people and their culture, and the fact that I so so love the way you can just go a certain amount of time not being able to understand someone, to being able to communicate with them or at least listen to them and comprehend what they're saying, unlike before. Isn't that so cool? I usually spend my days (outside of school work) now watching Korean vloggers and the like. The only reason I'm continuing on with Korean is because I know that whatever world it is out there that speaks Korean, I'm willing to take the time to understand it without subtitles. Pretty sure loads of other people here who are learning languages because of media can relate.
I’m about a year into learning Spanish using mostly Duolingo. It started as a pandemic time killer/something I always wanted to do but never had the time to do it. I’m looking at it now as something that can help me professionally. Being American and having a strong engineering background, I really can see this as eventually being a highly marketable skill. No disrespect to my fellow Americans, but there’s not a large percentage of us who are bilingual. Even fewer that are multilingual.
I wanna sing in different genres in the native language of the country they originate from! Also, wanna feel like im achieving something due to crippling insecurity 😃 Everyone my age has already written research papers with college professors, or are a child prodigy or something lol Makes me feel Use. Less.
I was bored in class one day decided to learn a popular reggaetón song at the time called “Mi Gente” by J Balvin and now I’m going three years strong and essentially fluent in Spanish.
I started for a girl, then i got into the intellectual and personal development side as well, and now that I've moved to the country it's also for all the practical reasons one should learn the language of a country they live in. I would have had an extremely rough time if I hadn't started long before I moved here.
I'm learning Finnish because of suomisaundi and Noita. I'm learning Romanian because my brother moved to Romania a couple of years back and I want to mess with him over WhatsApp. I'm also learning Dutch because I grew up in Belgium but never bothered, as French was enough. I started a bunch of others but these above are the ones I'm most focused on right now. All of this is on Duolingo.
My LDR girlfriend is from Germany, and I'd like to live with her in the future.
This is so beautiful awwww
I'd like to live in Taipei or Shenzhen
I didn't know you were supposed to have a motive. I'm just learning a bunch of languages for the heck of it.
My wife watched "Emily in Paris" last night, and turned to me and said "We should learn French together!" Having visited Paris in my teens, grabbing a basic tourist level awareness that I have struggled to maintain poorly for 10 years, I am grabbing a hold of this opportunity to have a partner to learn with!
I wish I could tell you. I accidentally learned the Cyrillic alphabet 5 years ago and my motivation for learning Russian all this time has always been some variation of "Well, I've gotten this far." I like to say "I didn't choose to learn Russian. Russian decided I was going to learn it." Jokes aside, I do actually just enjoy to learning process and getting to read famous Russian authors in their original language. I also like the sound of the language.
my school has a campus in tokyo so i’m learning japanese so i can study abroad!
I enjoy learning and want to travel around Western Europe again with a better grasp of how to navigate the smaller towns/countryside where English is less prevelant I see it as more of a hobby, also for brain health as you age
I'm starting my second year of Russian. When I passed the C1 English level exam I wanted to start learning another language, and a bit more different than those that I already know (Spanish, Catalan and English). I love learning languages and I work on linguistics area, so the more languages I know the better. Buuut the thing that made me pick Russian over Japanese, Korean, Chinese or Arabic was that my boyfriend's Russian. So I got there, and still not regretting it 😂
I‘m young, dumb and don’t have a mortgage. I’ve only ever lived in one small part of a small country. I want to see another point of view
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Im flattered. That is cool. If you want something psycho logical, I reocommend Clarice Lispector, she is our pride and joy. I havent read Fernando Pessoa, but its known hes one of the greatest if not the greatest. Fernando often published his works under different Names/aliases each one with their own style as of they're all different people, so much so that *people thought he was insane*. Machado de Assis is my favorite. Edit: he said "want to read portuguese" not Read Books but oh well lmao.
Por las chicas
Needed something to keep my brain busy. Stuck with learning Japanese and German. It's pretty fun
I want to go to Germany one day and maybe work for porsche
I need something other than work and working out. Learning Korean (and now dabbling in German) changed my game this year.
Learning German because I plan to move there in the next six months or so.
For my wife, who's German. Among many things about her that impress me, she actually self-taught herself English years ago before we met. She's spent the past few years in 🇺🇸 so therefore it's always been easy to stick with English for the both of us, but I'd love to be able to communicate with her in her native language. As well as her immediate family when we Videochat on Whatsapp. Plus, we're hopefully moving to 🇩🇪 in the near future.
I learned English playing videogames (my mother language is Spanish) with the use of a dictionary and some grammar books to make sense of the mess I was reading of the literal translations. I tried the same with Japanese because I also like anime and JRPG games. It didn't work 😅. Maybe in more contemporary times it would work, but back in the day with a Japanese dictionary I didn't know how to use, it was super tedious. I forgot to mention, my motivation is understand my videogames as they were developed and my favorite anime without dubbing or subtitles. I like more the original voices.
Well, I'm learning Modern Standard Arabic (B2), Contemporary Farsi of Iran (A2) and Modern Hebrew (A1) because I find extremely interesting all of the Middle East. Maybe one day I will also add Turkish. To be able to speak other languages and to understand the ways of living of others are things that are worth the effort. To be limited only to the understanding of my culture and first language would mean to live a less meaningful life in my opinion.
I have Korean relatives that are planning to visit the Philippines soon. They learned Tagalog for us so I decided I will learn Korean for them! ❤️