64 replies to this topic

[Ali]

My French is as close to fluent as I think I'll ever be. I lived there before and my husband and I now split our time between Paris and London due to his work. Studied it formally for 7 years, dabbled for a couple of years to keep it up to speed then did an intensive course before I moved there for a bit. The difference between learning and immersion was immense though. My French was very good but living in it was still a real struggle initially. After extended periods in Paris I find myself struggling to think of English concepts and words, not forgetting per se but sort of archiving!

Spanish I studied for 6 years, have kept up a bit since then. Can still read and listen to a very high level but I'm much slower on my written/spoken skills these days. I could certainly cope in almost all standard conversation but it's not particularly natural to me now.

My Italian and German are passable. Know a fair amount through music and dabbling. I can manage conversational stuff, can get by without issue on holiday etc. My reading is good enough to get the gist of a lot of text, everything else is poorer.

Currently focussing on Swedish. Sister in law is Swedish and my niece and nephew are now 7 and bilingual so it would be nice to know more. Pretty easy language to learn from English.

[Hopeless]

@Ali - wow, that must a lot of dabbling! Keeping up with that many languages must be pretty difficult.

[Ali]

@Ali - wow, that must a lot of dabbling! Keeping up with that many languages must be pretty difficult.

Natural head for languages and I've got a very good memory so I tend to retain a lot. My French is the only one I feel confident all round in. Don't think my Italian or German have improved at all in about 5 years now and I don't care for either of them enough that they ever will.

Plus French, Italian and Spanish are all romance languages so a lot of similarities.

[Sockoo]

@Hopeless well I don't know yet. I'll seach on google books to learn it, or something like. I'm thinking on French because I'll travel to study sometime to Canadá this year, so I'll probably be able to try to use it there.

[pancakeface]

It's amazing how multilingual everybody is. I can manage the most basic conversational language in a few other languages from watching tv.

 

I took German briefly but we went about it in a very casual way, so I don't even know if I'm pronouncing the words properly. I would like to be fluent in sign language, Spanish, German and Thai. But I'm really bad at languages and even attempting accents.

My French is as close to fluent as I think I'll ever be. I lived there before and my husband and I now split our time between Paris and London due to his work. Studied it formally for 7 years, dabbled for a couple of years to keep it up to speed then did an intensive course before I moved there for a bit. The difference between learning and immersion was immense though. My French was very good but living in it was still a real struggle initially. After extended periods in Paris I find myself struggling to think of English concepts and words, not forgetting per se but sort of archiving!

Spanish I studied for 6 years, have kept up a bit since then. Can still read and listen to a very high level but I'm much slower on my written/spoken skills these days. I could certainly cope in almost all standard conversation but it's not particularly natural to me now.

My Italian and German are passable. Know a fair amount through music and dabbling. I can manage conversational stuff, can get by without issue on holiday etc. My reading is good enough to get the gist of a lot of text, everything else is poorer.

Currently focussing on Swedish. Sister in law is Swedish and my niece and nephew are now 7 and bilingual so it would be nice to know more. Pretty easy language to learn from English.

 

When I first read this, I was like "Dream life". But the forgetting was unexpected and sounds potentially uncomfortable.

[Hopeless]

It's amazing how multilingual everybody is. I can manage the most basic conversational language in a few other languages from watching tv.

 

I took German briefly but we went about it in a very casual way, so I don't even know if I'm pronouncing the words properly. I would like to be fluent in sign language, Spanish, German and Thai. But I'm really bad at languages and even attempting accents.

 

When I first read this, I was like "Dream life". But the forgetting was unexpected and sounds potentially uncomfortable.

Hahah, "attempting accents" - I'm no good at them either.

[Wisdom]

@Hopeless French seems good, much more useful and easier to learn. Hopefully. >_<

[Ali]

When I first read this, I was like "Dream life". But the forgetting was unexpected and sounds potentially uncomfortable.

It's something I've always had though. You know when you occasionally stumble to find a word when you're mid-sentence? That, except I'll know exactly how to say it in French. I sometimes switch between them without realising as well. Highly confusing for people

[Hopeless]

@Hopeless French seems good, much more useful and easier to learn. Hopefully. >_<

Heheh I saw your post in the drawing thread ^^ That'll be awesome, I'd love to hear about your progress when you decide

 

It's something I've always had though. You know when you occasionally stumble to find a word when you're mid-sentence? That, except I'll know exactly how to say it in French. I sometimes switch between them without realising as well. Highly confusing for people

People in my family do this constantly. I do my best with the context I'm given, but sometimes I just won't know a word and it'll throw off the whole conversation

[HiMyNameIsNick]

I took English and Portuguese classes in high school. I can actually read some technical books I have in english, but my sintaxis sucks and I forgot everything I've learned in portuguese classes, but it's pretty(ish) similar to spanish.

[Hopeless]

I took English and Portuguese classes in high school. I can actually read some technical books I have in english, but my sintaxis sucks and I forgot everything I've learned in portuguese classes, but it's pretty(ish) similar to spanish.

 

 

Syntax is always what gets me, too What's your native language, if you took English and Portuguese in high school?

[HiMyNameIsNick]

Syntax is always what gets me, too What's your native language, if you took English and Portuguese in high school?

 

 

Spanish

[Checklist]

Learned  Filipino from my family to the point where I can read books, watch TV and understand it fairly but my comprehension is much greater compared to my speaking skills because I definitely use English a lot more where I live. I would not consider myself bilingual though until I can really speak it. It's really nice though to catch a few Filipinos and get their conversation, I look pretty white so I guess I am kind of a spy haha.

[Peaches]

I used to know German fluently when I was living there, migrated to Australia at the age of seven and since no-one practiced with me I forgot 99% of it 

 

I will live there again one day and pick it up, that's my plan.

[LittleBambi]

In my country, French is supposed to be our second language... I suck at French now, even though I had it 8 years in school. I forgot just about everything significant. Sure, I still know a couple of words, and understand it a little bit. But don't ask me to start a conversation in French, because then I'm at an utter loss.

My first language is Dutch. The other languages I know are English of course and German : ) I'm better at German than I am at French haha

 

I would love to learn Japanese. I know a couple of words and sentences from watching anime, but one day I will definitely try and learn everything. Maybe evening school, I don't know. And Chinese perhaps too.

[Hopeless]

@Checklist - It's awesome when you have family around to make sure you're on their level with a language. I'm mixed too, and sometimes it is kind of fun to surprise people when they expect a certain look/accent from you.

@MillionsOfPeaches - Do your parents [still] speak German? That's a great plan - if you knew it fluently once, it should be much easier to pick it back up again (I'd hope, heheh.)

@Shana2 - There are a few other people here who are also interested in learning Japanese (including myself) ^^ Turnip put together this nice little guide to some learning materials, if you're interested:

 

Google "kana mnemonics" and start with those. Should take only a few days to get both hiragana and katakana down assuming you're not lazy, two weeks at most.

For grammar download Genki .pdf files if learning simple travel stuff like "Hello", "Where is X place" etc. is enough for your immediate needs, but start with Tae Kim's Grammar Guide (don't only read, actually write shit down and memorize the new words) instead if you seriously want to get something done and properly learn the language.

For vocab get Anki and download Core 2000/4000 etc. decks. There's also voiced files floating around so you might want to look for them too. I suggest disabling the pictures as they're a crutch that prevent you from focusing on kanji.

If you have trouble memorizing kanji shapes or distinguishing them from each other start with Kanji Damage or Heisig's RTK1 (don't touch RTK2), plus their respective Anki decks.

Japanese starting guide:
https://docs.google....=h.6mzqwou67j69

 

[LittleBambi]

@Hopeless Thank you! I'll definitely take a look at that : D

[Oktober]

I learn languages very quickly, which is due to the fact that I've learned to speak two languages instead of one when I was little, Polish and Italian. 

 

Now I've been living in Germany for four years so of course I've learned to speak German too, of course not as well but that's still a lot. I've learned French at school and English at school on the Internet but my French is really pitiful. Especially the pronunciation gets me everytime, but it's quite similar to Italian so I tend to understand most of what I hear, if the person isn't too fast, that is.

 

I've been also learning a bit of Spanish by myself since I already understand half of what is being said due to the similarties with Italian, but it's going very slowly. I can order a beer tho

 

And being the anime freak that I am, I wanted to learn Japanese but as of now I can only say a few words, which aren't very useful - calling someone bakemono or shinigami isn't a good idea - and "Watashi wa inu desu", which means "I am a dog". 

[Peaches]

@Checklist - It's awesome when you have family around to make sure you're on their level with a language. I'm mixed too, and sometimes it is kind of fun to surprise people when they expect a certain look/accent from you.

@MillionsOfPeaches - Do your parents [still] speak German? That's a great plan - if you knew it fluently once, it should be much easier to pick it back up again (I'd hope, heheh.)

@Shana2 - There are a few other people here who are also interested in learning Japanese (including myself) ^^ Turnip put together this nice little guide to some learning materials, if you're interested:

 

My mum knows a couple sentences here and there in German, nothing solid though. My sisters know how to speak but not as fluently as I did when I was a kid. I'm pretty sure German is embedded somewhere in the back of my mind, I'll just have to fish it out again.

[Hopeless]

Gravedig to say I am currently learning Spanish (and brushing up on my Francais). I'm using Duolingo, the App and the website. Any other tips to learn espanol?

 

Heheh it's all good ^^ Turnip had mentioned that the My *Language* Coach DS series is pretty fantastic - looks like there's a My Spanish Coach, if you're into that idea! I wish they had more languages available... 

[xemos]

I learned french in high school but unfortunately I forgot most of it.

[Swar]

I don't have a DS I actually think Duolingo is the best app I have found, plus you can use the website which is even better. I wish my husband was learning too so he'd speak Spanish with me at home.

I love Duolingo, but it's not so popular here because you need to know English to learn anything other than Spanish.