The writing prompts invite postcrossers to write about a different topic on their postcards’ messages every month. These are just suggestions though — if you already know what you want to write about, or the recipient gives you some pointers, that’s great too!
Learning a new language is a common goal, so we think that HM’s suggestion of sharing what language you’re learning, or the languages you’d like to learn, should be fascinating!
Personally, I speak a little French and always mean to practice: I have a copy of The Hobbit (J.R.R. Tolkien) in French, and I periodically open up apps like Duolingo and Clozemaster to practice a bit… but that’s mostly just because that’s the language I learned in school. I know my accent is terrible, and there’s not much reason in my day-to-day life for me to speak any French, so it’s more of a mental exercise than anything.
It’s probably not too surprising though that I’d love to learn to speak Welsh. My wife used Duolingo to get some vocabulary, and is now using an app called Say Something in Welsh to practice more. I haven’t joined in yet, but… it’s tempting! I’d be starting from zero, really (I can count to ten in Welsh, and say a couple of phrases by rote), and I’m not sure I have the time yet. One day!
How about you? What languages are you studying, and which ones would you like to learn? You can share your thoughts in the comments, and/or use it as a prompt for something to write on your postcards!
78 comments so far
Personally I just LOVE TokiPona, I wish I had more people to speak with using it. TokiPona is the smallest artificial language with only like 120+ words in it and all the symbols are so cute!
Hello, I daily use Duolingo.
I learned German, English, Spanish at school. Living not far away from Italia, I decided to learn Italian by using Duolingo. After 1 year, I was able to order and book anything I needed during a trip to Savona and the Cinque Terre!
Hello everybody
my mothertongue is Bavarian, growing up bilingual with German. Learned English and French at school. Studied English and Italian linguistics at University. Teaching both languages. I once told myself not to travel to countries the language I don't speak, limited the amount of travelling destinations. Discovering Duolingo encouraged my aim to study even more languages. Also took classes in Spanish at 'Volkshochschule'.
Great topic, thank you! I'm kind of learning Chuvash, but I'm not very active in studies now. I try to use it as much as possible though. I'm forgetting Finnish, which makes me sad. I would like to learn Hill Mari. Also, I would like to visit Israel to use Hebrew not only with my students. And I've just tried your 'Say Something in Welsh' link, I like Welsh!
I said to myself that if I am to rigidly learn a language, it would be Mandarin. I have a Chinese descent and raised in a Chinese culture, speak the language, went to a Chinese school BUT didn't take it seriously. I regret that! Maybe I can still re-learn the language. My son is doing well at his young age and I told him not to be like me. Hope we get a lesson out from my post. Happy Postcrossing!
I took 3 years of French in high school and only remember a little of it. When I travel to a European country, I try to learn a couple of phrases such as, Do you speak English? Where is the toilet? Please and thank you.
Hello everybody,
Great topic idea ☺️. I love learning languages. During a normal day, I use 3 to 4 languages: I speak French, my first language, with my parents. I work in the German speaking part of Switzerland, so I use German at work. My boyfriend is German speaking, but together we speak English so that we have both around the same level. I’ve studied Spanish in Peru in 2014 but I forgot à lot of what I learned because I don’t practice this language that often. I understand Italian, but I’m really bad at speaking this language. During the lockdown in 2020 I learned a bit of Swedish. It’s a language I love but unfortunately I stopped it because I knew no one to practice with. I’ve been learning Ukrainian since March 2022, because I have Ukrainian neighbors. Unfortunately I’m not that good at it, I still have problems to read the Cyrillic alphabet and I should study it more regularly.
I wish you a happy Postcrossing.
I have completed a full Spanish course and can speak fairly fluently; capitalized on that during trips to the Dominican Republic, Spain, and Peru. Still hard for me to understand spoken Spanish, and to get the genders correct. Also Spanish has two words for "for", and it is difficult to be sure of the correct one to use. However, I am confident enough to write and receive postcards in Spanish.
Also have used the Pimsleur courses small amounts of conversational Dutch, Japanese, Icelandic, and Swiss German for trips to those countries. (For those familiar with Pimsleur, only the first 10-15 lessons.) Learning some of the language, at least enough to say things such as, "I would like to buy this", also helps dispel the "Ugly American" stereotype which some people still seem to have. Any of these languages, I don't even mention on my Postcrossing profile as I would definitely need to use an online translator.
Have a great day, everyone! 😀
-Phil
This has always been my passion! I've studied Russian, French and Spanish. I learned a little German while serving in the Army. Mandarin is next!
In collage I studied Italian. Always wanted to visit Italy but haven’t yet. The thing about learning a language is, it’s beautiful to be a linguist but if you don’t have anyone to talk to in that language, you forget it. You have to keep it up to be fluent.
I was born in The Netherlands, moving and living in Canada now. It was not easy to learn English but I did it. English is a difficult language.....
Ich arbeite seit 1. März in einem Internat für gehörlose Kinder und bin dabei die Gebärden-Sprache zu lernen. Es ist sooo interessant und die Kids freuen sich mir täglich neue Wörter und Sätze bei zu bringen :-)
I've been working in a boarding school for deaf children since March 1st and I'm learning sign language. It's sooo interesting and the kids are happy to teach me new words and sentences every day :-)
I learned French and Spanish in school. My conversational skills have atrophied over the years, but I do still like to read and listen to/watch programs in these languages from time to time.
For personal interest, I have studied Tibetan (for Buddhist studies), Japanese (for tea ceremony studies), and Irish (for fun), but I'm not remotely fluent in any of them. Tibetan and Japanese grammar are really similar, which surprised me! It's mentally refreshing to step outside the Indo-European suite of languages and learn something completely different.
I'm a big language nerd. I was learning Arabic, Bengali and English while watching Hindi entertainment on TV when I was 5-6 years old. In high school, I took 2 years of American Sign Language. In college, I got an year of French. Later, I got interested in Turkish because of their TV shows so I was briefly learning that. Recently, I got back on Freerice and tried my hand at various language quizzes...I tried Italian, Romanian, Latin, German and Spanish quizzes...I like it! Because I'm able to draw similarities with the languages I know. :D Therefore, I'm thinking of starting formal lessons for one of those languages.
When I said in my profile that feel free to use any language, I TRULY MEANT IT.
Hello everyone!
I took ASL (American Sign Language) in high school, but now I study Dutch via Duolingo, and I use YouTube to help me with whatever Duolingo doesn't provide. I still know some signs, and the alphabet in ASL, but never use it anymore. I highly recommend learning a Deaf language, though, either ASL or the one your country uses! Very helpful when you're in a quiet environment and need to communicate with others!
I visited my friend last year who lives in Belgium, and I took up Dutch when I was planning to visit again. Although we are no longer friends, so I keep up with it to keep my brain stimulated and my goal in life is to never know just one language!
If I ever become happy with my Dutch level, I've always been interested in Korean, I think it's a beautiful language whenever I hear it. So maybe I will study that one day.
Great idea for a prompt! Thanks.
I was born in the USA but grew up in Spain, learned Spanish and French and as able to work in both languages (I'm old enough to have learned to take shorthand in French when I was working in Paris). I studied Italian after college, learned enough Irish to be able to pronounce it, and since the pandemic I have been learning German, which has been great. There are so many German postcrossers I get to customize my postcards to each person! My German conversation group will meet tonight on Zoom to watch a film in German (with German subtitles).
I also love learning languages. At school I studied English. Now at Duolingo I study 14 languages at the same time. It is very interesting to find similarities in languages.
I used to study German at school, but unfortunately I don't remember it at all. At the age of 40, I suddenly wanted to study English, and now I study duolingo every day, and I really like it.
Spanish speaker as second language! Originally learned, like many, in high school (secondary school) and managed to keep some of it. In 1990, I drove down with a friend in order to share expenses and we visited a small village where he already had connections. Because I still wasn't fluent, carried a huge dictionary and finally, because he wanted to surf and I wanted to find all the musicians, we went our separate ways agreeing to meetup again a few months later to drive back the the states. At that point, we were camping on the beach further south and I traded my stay learning how to rake the sand for ciggie butts, wash tablecloths in a scrub basin, and became very friendly with the grandparents of the owners. Shortly after, I got staph from the bug bites being infected by the swimming river, and had to go inland. Now, the adventure, and the learning, started. I hitchhiked inland, going from one town to another on my way to Mexico City, where the grandparents lived and wanted me to come stay. You want to learn a language fast? It became necessary! Dropped off in Paracho, the town famous for its guitars, I didn't quite understand what the drive said. He repeated himself, and I still didn't get it until he motioned with one hand the symbol for OK and moved his other finger in-and-out! OMG!! All I could manage was "No, no, yo no soy esa typo de mujer!" (I'm not that kind of woman) but it was a very quick intro to what they don't teach you in class.
Bringing it up to now, 30-some years later, I have a degree, tutored Spanish at university level, and have lived and travelled in many places throughout Mexico. I travel solo and as an artist and musician, many of those times I was with one of a few different Mexican boyfriends (so romantic and hypnotic in the way that the poetry and flowers flows from their lips and when they look at you it's like you are the most delicious dessert!) and we sold our handcrafts and played music on the streets. It's the best way to really pick up on the slang and when, and when not, to use it, and really brings one into really learning the historical and cultural aspects of this amazing, beautiful and complicated country and its many different peoples.
I am learning Spanish using Duolingo and have been pleased to add a number of new "friends" from Postcrossing--so much so, I put it in our "about us" information! :-)
I have this passion for European Cinema, and have been focusing on Swedish-language films. Sometimes I like to pretend that I'm speaking Swedish in a Roy Andersson film.
I want increase my english and remind again my japanese
I would like to master all languages - but I don't want to learn them! I learned English at school for about 6 years, which I speak reasonably well. Later I did an Italian course at the adult education center that lasted about 2 years. For a trip, a friend and I taught ourselves Russian, which was very difficult, but I can still read the Cyrillic letters to this day. I would really like to know Hebrew because I love Israel very much and like to travel there. For a while I tried to teach myself Spanish, but since I never had to use it, the knowledge was lost again.
I would like to improve my level of English. this language is used in all spheres of life. I just need it. I also like the sound of the English language. I'd like to speak English more often, but I'm kind of embarrassed to make a mistake.
LATVIAN, one of the few Indo-Germanic languages left. Worth a study as then you could slip into Lithuanian. Estonian/Finn...difficult and from the planet of Zorkon (not really)
Dw i'n dysgu Cymraeg! I'm learning Welsh...my mother spoke it, as she was brought up in north Wales, and I started a couple of months ago. My favourite word so far is bochwen - it means hamster, and literally is 'fat cheeks'. I'm always in awe of other nationalities that speak English so well.
I have so many languages that I want to speak!!
At the moment I learn french and english at school, but I try to to learn polish,russian and korean by myself !
Honestly I'm learning multiple languages at the same time..
It's very confusing!!!
Hello!
I was born and bred in Greece, so my native tongue is Greek and I can translate a good bunch of ancient Greek text. My second language is English. I am pretty good in French, Spanish and I know some very basic German.
I would love to perfect the languages I listed above plus learn Italian and Swedish.
Great article, I daily use Duolingo app., I learned English at school. but since I moved to California, I decided to learn Espanol by using Duolingo since most people are Hispanic and some don't want to speak English. After 1 year, I was able to reach the intermediate level, also I have many friends who are correcting my Espaol in daily life, then I decided to learn at the same time Nederlandse and Deutsch because I have many postcards friends from both countries!
My latest languages that I have learned are Mandarin and Arabic. I studied Mandarin for one year in courses, but I cannot speak or understand it. However, I enjoy writing addresses in han characters on postcards :D
HFeits- I think you are right about where Estonian and Finnish come from 😂
What language I'd study if? Basque one, its mysterious and interesting one
I am so impressed with everyone's language abilities and desire to speak different languages. I also surmise that Duolingo is a useful app! When I was younger I lived in Japan for a year and loved learning Japanese. I also studied Spanish and French. I'd love to be able to speak more Norwegian and Italian- all wonderful languages. I can understand why people think English is difficult. It's hard for me too to speak when I know I'm making mistakes, but I guess you have to do it anyways. Most people are quite kind.
Chinese is my mother tongue. I've learned English since young. It took me years and efforts to speak fluently. 4 or 5 years ago I started to learn German.
Being kind of a linguistics nerd, I can not help but share some of it here :)
My first language is Russian, but I also learnt Belarussian at school, and I think I can speak it quite decently.
I also learnt English at school, and my teachers managed to fascinate me so much that I decided to study foreign languages when I went to university. I use English daily at work and for fun, and honestly, it already feels like a second native language to me.
Then I took up German as a second language of choice at university. But I was not successful at it. I graduated the foreign languages department six years ago, and I can barely speak any German, however I understand some of it in the written form.
I attended Italian language courses for a short period of time, so I can read and understand some very basic Italian.
And then I discovered Duolingo! I think it's such an amazing tool which makes learning languages so fun! Currently I learn Spanish via Duolingo - I chose it because I'm fascinated by Latin American culture. I'm already making some progress and it brings me so much joy!
Next, I'd love to learn some Swedish and Arabic. And maybe Korean? We'll see :)
I studied English, French and Italian at school and have tried to use them as often as possible since then, so I am fluent in all three languages.
Some years ago I learned Spanish on my own before going on holidays to Mexico and I still can understand and speak (though quite far from perfect grammar).
Just a few days ago I started learning a little Indonesian for a holiday trip in October - for us it is essential being able to know at least some basic words of the local language.
Duolingo is really amazing app for learning languages. As my first foreign language is English, I don't waste time learning it in the app. As for Spanish, for me it's necessary to use like "combo" - Duolingo and offline real seminars with the teacher of the language, as many aspects of the living real spoken language can't be taught by Duolingo.
The same for Dutch - they have many forms of denial; e.g. "niet", "geen" and "nee". Duolingo isn´t create to explain how to use these denial forms in Dutch. That's their biggest problem.
But all in all, learning new languages is amusing and very-very intriguing as not all the Postcrossing users know English or speak it fluently. For me, it's a great experience to learn Spanish and Dutch, while practising my writing skills here!
Hello. I haven't studied a new language, but I just keep up with the languages I speak. English, Spanish, Portuguese, and French. In California English and Spanish are dominant and the others I try to keep up with books, music, podcasts, YouTube. I think my age is done with retaining languages, even though Dutch (Nederlands) has been in my interest. Turkish and Hebrew I only know for specific purposes. Thank you, greetings from northern California.
I grew up multilingual, having Dutch and German parents and living in South Africa with Afrikaans and English. At school and at the university in Germany, I learned French and later I took Spanish classes. Out of boredom I started learning Japanese last year and quite enjoy it, although it is quite challenging too.
At school I studied Finnish, Swedish, German, English and Russian languages. I have always been very keen on studying languages, all my life. I speak fluent Portuguese which I have learned in Portugal in my youth. I have taken courses in Esperanto, Japanese, Ucrainia, Arabic, French, Polish. At the moment, I am taking an online course in French and beside doing also Duolingo excercises. Last month I have been interrailing with my friend and using many languages :)
Dear all,
Languages are a great hobby and opened me many a door all around the world. I have two languages I dream to still learn: Norwegian (country of my heart) and Russian (would love to travel Siberia). I grew up in the germand speaking part of Switzerland and did learn French (CH-Lausanne), Spanish (ES-Cadiz) and English (CA-Vancouver) and Italian with a good friend from Italy. In the meantime Dutch has been added (my partner is Dutch) and whenever we are somewhere travelling I like to speak the language of the country and worst case English is always a good option.
NB: Spanish is the language of my heart... I am told I change personality when speaking it ;-)
Have a great day everybody
Hello, I speak German fluently, I will write postcards in German to those that are able to read German. I also speak some French and Spanish. I know some words in Czech. My son-in-law and daughter are learning Italian, I will need to read more books in German.
Frederick
Hello!!! I am Brazilian, so Portuguese is my mother tongue... I've studied English since my childhood... I graduated in French at University... I have been studying Spanish for about 10 years... I studied Latin, but I don't remember anything... and my goal is to study and improve my poor Italian, since it's the language of half of my ancestors!!
My mother tongue is Swiss German. At the moment I'm improving my French and going back to school.
Good time to all
Growing up in Arizona, I took high school Spanish classes, but unfortunately retained little due, among other things, to having little chance of practicing the language. Working in a hotel and meeting guests from all over the world piqued my interest in different languages, and made it fun especially as many of those people shared some of their own basic phrases with me (most notably Japanese and Chinese).
Travelling, living and working in Europe for awhile, I had opportunities to learn a little of several languages, but mainly used German.
And then I became the mother to a young man with PDD Autism who happens to be non-verbal. So I quickly learned some ASL - American Sign Language as my son was learning it in his school. It became challenging for me because my son had what I describe as "his own dialect" and often made up signs of his own.
Bottom line -- I think the best language is simply the Language of Love -- an appreciation and enjoyment for learning and sharing in whatever method one can use for communicating with someone else.
I have always been fond of learning other languages. When I was 18, I studied Russian at the Volkshochschule (an evening school for adults) for three years and later French and Spanish at the university.
I also learned a little Dutch, as the Netherlands are near my hometown.
Now I will begin to learn Hindi, I‘m really looking forward to the treat!
I've been studying Japanese for 3 years but I am still barely an N5 level. I love pulling addresses for people in Japan so I can try out my writing, they are always super appreciative of my efforts. :)
I studied French in high school and still maintain a reading ability. Duolingo has been great to update my vocabulary. Studied Bahasa Indonesia at University and am still fairly fluent. Also some Dutch and Russian. Currently studying Latin and Ancient Greek. I really believe in the proverb that 'you live a new life for every language you speak. If you know only one language, you only live once"
So nice to see this writing prompt!
:)
I'm always trying to learn Spanish as it's the most practical for me. I know solo un poco🤏🏼
It just never seems to fully stick in my brain. Because of our German heritage my youngest daughter is trying to teach herself that with Duolingo. I am in awe of people who can speak many languages.
Hello, everyone. I always liked studying foreign languages. But I have no practice for them, so this level of knowledge we have called "I feel like a dog - I understand, but I can't say". At school I chose German (I can still say hello and tell the poem about Lorelei), in the institute our German teacher quit and we were retrained in English. I got interested in Japanese (I liked the sound of it), studied it in courses, tried Chinese, but gave up almost immediately. Now I'm interested in trying Turkish and pulling up English. I use the Droops app for studying - it's not hard to spare 5 minutes a day.
Online translator helps a lot - you can write a few words in any language (except hieroglyphs, of course)
Hi everyone,
my second language is English, and thanks to my native language (Slovak) I can use Czech and understand Polish.
I also studied French during high school and I can write basic sentences with a translator, but I don´t speak.
Currently, I am studying German (with the teacher) and Danish on Memrise.
During the past few years, I also experimented with studying Finnish, Irish and Icelandic, but it was so difficult that I gave up - but I want to try again sometime! :)
There is a joke: What do you call someone who speaks three languages? Trilingual. What do you call someone who speaks two languages? Bilingual. What do you call someone who speaks one language? American.
I'm afraid that's me. I studied French in high school and college. I read passingly well but with my Southern accent, I don't speak French intelligibly at all. I can ask for directions in Spanish, and read half a dozen phrases in Italian. Otherwise, I'm hopelessly American and communicate exclusively in English.
I like this topic.
Japanese is my native language. I studied English at school and Spanish by myself. At university I chose Russian and Polish because I was interested in Slavic languages.
Now I'm thinking to start Spanish, German and Dutch.
I would like to learn as many languages as I can.
I didn't know what caused me to be attracted to French when I had to take a foreign language class in middle high school. My sister took 2 years of German. I gave up to continue after one semester. Then the interest to learn French again came back to me several times throughout the years. Later years, I found out that I had two ancestors that spoke French (Switzerland) and German. No wonder it is in my heritage. I am doing French on Duolingo and I love it! I’ve done some of German.
This Washington Post article is amazing!
“The remarkable brain of a carpet cleaner who speaks 24 languages.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/interactive/2022/multilingual-hyperpolyglot-brain-languages/
hyperpolyglot
My first language is English (US), but I studied German at university and then moved here in 2014. Now, I speak more German than English in my day-to-day life.
Since 2021, I've been studying Spanish via private, online classes once a week.
Once I have Spanish at a decent enough level (B2? C1?), I'd like to learn Portuguese.
But I'd love to be able to speak Finnish, Turkish, Polish and Arabic one day... I'm just not sure how realistic that is!
Hallo i speak limburgs and nederlans because i am from holland.
Limburgs is a dialect from the south.
We live verry. close to the border from Germany so i speak also perfectly german.
I have an amarikan and italian brother in low and speak there for also these . I,m dislektic writing is difficult in al the langguitches without my autocorrect . If i send a card i always write a little bit in the language of the receiver and groetjes at the end.
Have a nice day en groetjes linda
Hello, my native language is Russian. I studied English at school and university and it helped me travel) I speak and understand a little Ukrainian, my aunts and cousins live in Ukraine. After several trips to Italy, I started learning Italian with a teacher and continue on my own)) Unfortunately, I can't speak freely, but I understand a lot! To study, I listen to the radio, music and watch movies in Italian and it's very exciting!
I am fluent in English but hope to one day also be fluent in Spanish. I took Spanish in school for 4 1/2 years but did not retain enough to be fluent. I'm sure one day I'll be able to speak, understand, read, and write in Spanish.
J'ai étudié le français pendant un certain temps mais maintenant je suis occupé à apprendre plus d'anglais car je pars à l'étranger.
I grew up with my native language German, and a German Dialect called "pfälzisch". At school I learned English and many years later I started with Japanese. I really love Japan, their culture, their language and so on. And that's the reason I wanted to learn Japanese. I visited a Evening-School (is this the right word?) to learn it and also at some private lessons at home of my Japanese-Teacher. In 2019 (or was it in 2020?) I made the Japanese-Language Proficiency Test in Germany on Level N5, which I passed. :) Today I think, my level is between N5 and N4.
My native language is Chinese. Chinese characters have the history of several thousand years. Different from alphabetical languages, the Chinese characters have its unique discipline. Every character is like a small kid’s drawing. “手”(hand) is like a palm with five fingers and a wrist. “山”(mountain) is like rolling peaks.You may find the pleasure when learning chinese:)
And I am learning Korean as my third country language, some of them origin from chinese, so it may more easier for me to get to know it!
As a PhD student in linguistics, I'm a full-time language lover! I speak English and Mandarin, and my research also touches on Turkish, Japanese, Korean, and Samoan! As a linguist, I study how different languages of the world have different/similar underlying patterns and rules, and how they reflect the intricate and fascinating human cognitive system responsible for processing/producing language!
Finland has only 6 mil.people living here,95%of us speak Finnish and for 5%swedish is native language.Most of us have studied Swedish as second language at school.I started with Swedish on 2nd grade, lots of Swedish in my life.In a small country like Finland to get interesting job is knowledge of languages,finnish is so difficult for foreigners to learn.
It´s better to study yourself to speak with others outside Finland.
Myself I have studied Swedish,german,english(lived in Canada for a year to be more fluent),Spanish,italian..but Japan is my great "love"I studied it for three years, still I speak like 4 year old..but it´s beautiful language and so interesting!!!Honto ni!!!Korea sounds nice too, but time limitations man..
Please study Finnish too, we are nice people and even shy still easy to talk to.Mistakes do not matter, it´s the effort that counts!!
Hello, my first language is English, but I have been learning Spanish for about two years now. I'm not very good at forming sentences, however I have started to recognize words in Spanish shows and music. I use Duolingo daily and it has been a great tool!
I have English as my native language, learned to understand a bit of Portuguese, Spanish, French through school and family. I’ve used Duolingo for French and Language Drops for Italian. My desire is to have a working knowledge of Croatian before I am able to travel there.
Hello you all! My hometown is Hamburg, but due to my parents we moved a lot throughout the whole world and so I can speak English, French and Italian. Due to my work and writing here my postal cards I use frequently English, some times French and Italian or German. I live now a long time with my family in Munich, Bavaria and my kids can speak the Bavarian dialect from Garmisch Partenkirchen and Munich and English and French. My original dialect Nordfriesisch (special dialect from island Föhr) as well as the normal Northern dialect is very rare to hear and I think I am after my grandparents and my mother the last one of my family who can speak, write and understand it. That's a pity, but my kids don't like the dialect and prefer Bavarian from my husband and family.
My mothertongue is German. In school I learned English and speak it very well, because of my last job where I used it 95% per day (many international colleagues). My grandpa teached me a little bit French (but I also had it as an optional subject). In "Volkshochschule" I learned Italian (but I skipped it after the first semester). During the COVID-Lockdown I decided to learn Bulgarian (I have a passion for slavic languages) on my own. I found a great course online, where I can learn in my own pace. I will start from the beginning this year, because of my new job I had not much time, but always listen to bulgarian pop music. I won't lose the feeling for this language. My biggest dream is, to speak all languages of the world, but this is just a dream.
I do Duolingo, and am learning French and Spanish! I love Paris, and want to move there, and my friend (hopefully boyfriend) is part Mexican, so I want to surprise him with Spanish!
I can’t remember a time that I didn’t love words! A love of words became a love of languages. I studied French up until 1st year of college. In college I spent a semester studying Spanish and a semester learning German. I had a friend who was a deaf education major and she taught me American Sign Language which I continue to learn til this day. Unfortunately no one in my family speaks another language. One sister knows a little ASL. So, I use Spanish at work when speaking to patients, making my medical Spanish better than conversational Spanish. I didn’t want to lose my French so I watch movies with the subtitles in French and I use Memrize app to hear people speak. I also watch you tube videos.
I am currently learning the Hebrew alphabet. I also have a book to learn the Russian alphabet with the hope of reading Dostoevsky in his native tongue someday. I can read Italian and understand a little Portuguese. I wish to also learn Arabic and Chinese mandarin, and Japanese. So much to learn so little time.
Hu sen guiya i linguahihu, Chamoru natibu para i taotao Marianas! Ti megai na taotao kumekuentos gi linguahin mami ya in keke spiha impeniu para in na mas låla.
I love my Chamoru language, native tongue of the people of the Marianas. There are not many people who speak our language today and we are trying to find different means to make it more alive (used).
I like to learn languages that surround me. I was in Okinawa for 7 years learned conversational Japanese, my grandson played ball with kids from central America so picked up on some spanish, neighbors and friends from Palau, Korea, and Philippines so learned some words from each... language opens communications and betters relationships!
At the beginning of the pandemic I found post crossing, and to keep busy I decided to learn Italian on Duolingo.Being that Spanish is my second language that helped me with Italian being that it's very close to Italian. And after two years I decided to go to Venice, but because I had never spoken it with anyone I was not actually to speak it! a few words here and there but then I would convert to English or Spanish. I no longer use Duolingo, but now I'm thinking about learning Portuguese and Dutch.
I can read several words in a few languages, in context. In genealogy, I can recognize words pertinent to genealogical documents, like birth, marriage, death, baptism and burial. Languages for genealogy are English, French, Latin, Danish, German, Dutch, Swedish, Spanish, Italian, Russian, Ukrainian and Polish. I can also read most musical notation/directions on a score in Italian, French, German and of course English, my native tongue. Polish and handwritten Russian and Ukrainian are a bit tough though :)
I can read French better than I can speak or write it, high school was a long time ago.
Guten tag！！
My mother tongue is Chinese and I studied English at school, but my grades were terrible and I failed every time. To be honest, Chinese education is about opening your brain and pouring it in with a big bucket of nonsense knowledge, then closing your brain again and asking you while you're trying to digest it, "You don't know how to do that?" Then open your brain again and pour it in again.
Some of the students who found a way to do this learnt fast, but I was at a standstill and when I tried to fall in love with English, I could only see the footprints left by my peers, I walked slowly but helplessness surrounded me, but new knowledge would not wait for me. My English has been terrible from the very beginning until now. Of course I tried to remedy the situation, but I only had a day and a half off in a fortnight and during the school year I had 13 classes a day from 6:00 am to 10:00 pm.
I took a break from school, so I had the time to run back to the top of the road and start studying again. At the same time I developed a great passion for the German language and I am starting to learn it.
I'm fluent in English and American Sign Language. I'd like to learn Norwegian. I knew it when I was 9...but forgot how to speak it, read it and write it.
I'm fluent in many languages as a result of my multilingual family :)
I am currently studying Mandarin Chinese!
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