Foreign languages are sometimes easy, sometimes hard to learn, sometimes impossible to get at all. They may interest you, but they may also bore you. When sometimes struggling with them, they often remind you how wonderful it is to be able to speak in your mother tongue. When you do so you can let the words flow from your mouth without a worry of did this and that come out correctly. It is, or should be, enough when you can make yourself understood, but who wouldn’t like to do it perfectly, or at least nearly perfectly.
Even though I’ve spoken quite a lot of Portuguese since my exchange year in Brazil in ‘97 I wonder can you ever learn it or any language fully. Well, my dad learnt pretty amazing fluent Finnish and, yeah, there are many of us who can play with English and other languages very fluently. So, it is possible! I’ve realized that maybe I’m just a bit too strict about the matter of how fluent is good enough…
I’ve enjoyed my 4th time in Brazil in many ways but also because of the exciting trip to the secrets of this language. It’s not new to me anymore, but I have learnt to use it in a new way. I’ve learnt to speak the Portuguese that my friends speak. This is what people find sometimes hilarious. “Well, I’m trying my best to speak like yas do”, I say… And this is a great thing, because now I have more vocabulary to play with and I don’t have to always use the same boring “learnt from a textbook” type of stuff… But I reckon there will always be things to learn, always.
Even though mixing words etc. can take you sometimes to small/big misunderstandings and this way to embarrassing moments I find them often as good fun! At least many times I’ve said funny stuff when I’ve wanted to say something neutral… For example, around the New Year’s Eve I asked “Hey, shall we go and see the stove [fugão] on the beach!?” when I wanted to say bonfire [fugeira]. I should keep a list of them and other similar stories as they can brighten a cloudy day!
Do you have any good stories made of “mistakes”? Share them and make us laugh:D
Even though I’ve spoken quite a lot of Portuguese since my exchange year in Brazil in ‘97 I wonder can you ever learn it or any language fully. Well, my dad learnt pretty amazing fluent Finnish and, yeah, there are many of us who can play with English and other languages very fluently. So, it is possible! I’ve realized that maybe I’m just a bit too strict about the matter of how fluent is good enough…
I’ve enjoyed my 4th time in Brazil in many ways but also because of the exciting trip to the secrets of this language. It’s not new to me anymore, but I have learnt to use it in a new way. I’ve learnt to speak the Portuguese that my friends speak. This is what people find sometimes hilarious. “Well, I’m trying my best to speak like yas do”, I say… And this is a great thing, because now I have more vocabulary to play with and I don’t have to always use the same boring “learnt from a textbook” type of stuff… But I reckon there will always be things to learn, always.
Even though mixing words etc. can take you sometimes to small/big misunderstandings and this way to embarrassing moments I find them often as good fun! At least many times I’ve said funny stuff when I’ve wanted to say something neutral… For example, around the New Year’s Eve I asked “Hey, shall we go and see the stove [fugão] on the beach!?” when I wanted to say bonfire [fugeira]. I should keep a list of them and other similar stories as they can brighten a cloudy day!
Do you have any good stories made of “mistakes”? Share them and make us laugh:D
1 comment:
this is one of those oh-yeah-that-has-totally-happened-to-me-but-crap-i-can't-think-of-an-example-now. at all!
so when you heading to the beautiful north again?
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