timppu: I like it that I can tell people abroad what shitheads they are at their face or comment on their appearance, and they have no idea what I'm saying. It is like my own code language, I'd hate to know only some widely known language like English.
Dzsono: I prefer it when shitheads know exactly what I think of them. In this case, I'm glad I know English. But it is difficult to learn other languages if your mother tongue is English because everybody speaks English and will default to that language rather than continue a stuttering conversation.
Depends what country you live in and where you are in that country. I couldn't get anything done if I couldn't speak Chinese. I know a small amount at the present,but everything takes so long when you're having to gesture and mime everything you want or need.
Also, people tend to be rather obliging when you make it clear that you're wanting to use their language. The main problem folks have is when you look like your in pain or suffering greatly. If it's awkward for them, they're more likely to switch into whatever English they do know.
Dzsono: Yeah, I thought they would be similar too until I started using my Finnish phrasebook. Seriously, it may as well have been Chinese. Although a Finnish friend of mine went to study in Estonia and she learned it very quickly. But maybe that's an exception to the rule because she is amazing at learning languages. Sometimes I forget she is Finnish when speaking English because she sounds like an American...
People make too big a deal out of learning a language. A language is a tool and as long as you use the tool you'll pick up more of it. It's also something which is at least 90% effort and very little of it is actual talent.
The big difference between me failing miserably to learn Japanese, Latin and German and my much greater success with German the second time and Chinese has been the amount of work I've put into it. But, not just work, I've been going at it in a much more intelligent fashion.
I've just finished reading The 3rd Ear by Chris Lonsdale and it was most informative. I mostly knew a lot of that because of my occupation, but it was somewhat nice to realize that I was far better off in my foreign languages than I have given myself credit for.
For those willing to put in 4 or 5 hours a day of serious work, becoming fluent in 3 months is hardly unheard of. But, it is intense and it does require a ton of work to do. What's interesting is that it doesn't appear to require much in the way of talent. Just the willingness to commit oneself and work like hell at things that are helping.
