tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2309385158537254711.post8050097616632929873..comments2023-09-26T12:18:39.374+03:00Comments on Boreal Expat: Language Learning, Or Not So MuchKent Tankersleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01848650819768345044noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2309385158537254711.post-31349187382328977342017-04-24T17:09:23.035+03:002017-04-24T17:09:23.035+03:00You, me, and Sam Cooke all have something in commo...You, me, and Sam Cooke all have something in common, it seems.<br /><br />I used to think that the USA was unique in being stubbornly addicted to one language (which we tend to speak in butchering dialets--mea culpa). But I have come to understand that the UK is similar in that respect, with most citizens there refusing to learn even a second language.<br /><br />When I did take German in community college classes, I was told on several occasions by different people that Finnish is easily one of the most difficult languages on the planet to learn for a non-native. Even one of my old Finnophile friends told me that. And I read an account of a Nazi German officer posted in Finland during WWII wherein he bemoans the language that he was laboring to learn, calling it (and this was itself an English translation): "bloody gibberish".<br /><br />I met a woman once who was fluent in seven languages and she told me that she was defeated by Finnish.<br /><br />You'll probably finally achieve fluency and it will be an aha! moment. (Slipped a little Yiddish in there.) And keep in mind that you are light years ahead of 90% of all of the citizens of your native country.<br />James Robert Smithhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17281049641681225389noreply@blogger.com