Learning new languages

I am pretty bad at it, but I love learning new languages.

It took me nearly a decade to become fully fluent in English and lose my accent. I can finally fool people into thinking I'm a native speaker.

It took me 2 years to become fully conversational in French, but nobody would be fooled into thinking I am a native speaker.

I'm now starting Vietnamese, and I don't know if I will ever master the tones. It is my first tonal language and I find it exciting.

Some people pick up languages in just 2 to 3 months and amaze me, as it takes me so much longer, but I love the process. Taking something that is complete gibberish to you initially, and then slowly over time returning to it (a song or a poem or a TV show or whatever) and magically seeing it gain meaning over the weeks and months (and in my case years) as you learn the language.

Have any of you learned new languages just for the fun of it? Do you feel the same sense of awe when doing it?

 

So do I

 

I have never been any good at learning languages. After two years of high school German and living for a total of about ten years in Germany, my car remained inoperable for days until I found out a muffler was an "Auspuf Topf". And after two years of Mandarin I can now say "Wo ai Ni" (I love you) and "Wo mai bi" (I sell a pen).

 

That's so sweet. You can sell pens to people you love.

 

It is a rare word, this Auspuff or Auspufftopf.
I am German - but do not care for all those parts of the car - I am not a mechanic!

 

Sadly, I speak no German at all.

 

I personally hate learning new languages, except computer languages.

I never managed that nor was this ever my intention. English "Natives" always detect my foreign roots. They often think I'm from France or Italy. Don't know why. Maybe it's my skinny body and black hair.

 

"Auspuff" is a common word in Germany.
Let me welcome you, my German brother.

 

Which of these languages do you speak?

>>> http://www.politicalforum.com/index...o-you-speak-fluently-or-less-fluently.593403/

 

Auspuff - yes
Auspufftopf - less

Yes, I am a poet
and I do know-it!

 

Standard German was my first foreign language - so to speak.
My mother tongue is Alemannisch - like they speak in Switzerland.

 

One interesting thing about language I find entertaining is that many of them have a word for the language itself that is different from the English word. Obvious if you think about it, but cool. Same for country names.

German and Germany are a good example. Why do we make up a name for counties/languages and not just use what they call themselves.

 

I also very much enjoy funny things about different languages and coincidences.

For example:

"Toi" means you in French, but me in Vietnamese.

"Ha" is Thai for 5. So instead of lol, they write 555

In Thai, if you are a man you add "krap" after pretty much everything you say to make it polite. Women say "ka". It makes me wonder what Thai culture would do if the woke pronoun expansion we have in the west went over to them.

In Tagalog, instead of krap or ka, you say po after everything to make it polite.

"Bababa ba?" Is Tagalog for "Going down?"

In English, you have one hair, 2 hairs, but a head of hair (not hairs).