language be hard

[6opou]

I've now been in Belgium for over a year, and overall the experience has been really incredible. There is so much to see, explore, and contemplate. But I have to admit that the language thing has been difficult

Comments

[oriori1]

does the language thing have a hilarious side? for example, when i spoke spanish in s. america, i often translated American English idioms and made wordplay that ended up busting folks' guts.

Examples: "kick the bucket" does not mean "to die" in spanish, at least where i was. that caused some giggling. another time I was in a place called Plaza Huincul and I asked how are the Plaza Huinculitos (which I translated in my head to mean the little folks from Plaza Huincul), not realizing that "culitos" means little butts. hilarity.

[6opou]

Sure. I hit fun little translation stuff all the time with my friends at work. My coworkers L, J, and D and I laugh a good bit about weird translations.

[zuleikhajami]

Yes, that was my experience in Morocco, too. I had some wonderful friends there, but I always felt (and told them) that they couldn't know me 100% in Moroccan Arabic.

[aq777]

You can speak French here all you want and people will only think it sounds fabulously sexy. Welcome home!

[goulo]

Mi konas la senton, ke la ligoj inter homoj de malsamaj naciaj lingvoj estas kvazaŭ tra mallarĝa kanalo pro la lingva baro de la nacia lingvo... Efektive estas kulturaj baroj ankaŭ, pro komunaj fonaj scioj, kiujn ili havas kaj mi ne havas. Tamen estas progreso (eĉ se diable malrapida kun la pola), kaj eĉ malpli profundaj proksimaj amikecoj povas esti tre plaĉaj kaj bonaj... :)

[shannou]

After 7 years of French in school, when I first lived in France I had the same problem. I would go out to parties in the south of France and tell people, "I'm actually somewhat intelligent and interesting, just in not in this language."

It got better and I learned to relish the corrections as free moments to learn. I constantly encouraged people to correct me so that the repetition of my mistakes would become more apparent to me.

It took living there and taking French classes for three years before I gained this level of fluency in which I can actually be myself in the language. And it feels like an accomplishment to have worked up to have a few very close friends who know me only in French.

Ne perds pas de courage! Je suis fiere de toi!