Learning a Language?

Oh! I want to do the same, my boyfriend lived there for a few years since his father was stationed there. I've actually never travelled outside of the USA at all, and I think it would be interesting for him to go back, but it would be helpful if at least one of us knew a little bit of Japanese to help us navigate around. Where would you like to go in Japan? Any place specific?

Well I mainly wanna go there and buy cute stuff~ So I would like to go to the Sanrio shop, kiddyland and one of the Pokemon shops
 
Well I mainly wanna go there and buy cute stuff~ So I would like to go to the Sanrio shop, kiddyland and one of the Pokemon shops

The Sanrio shop is adorable, I would love to go there too! I think I'd like to just explore 宮島 (みやじま) to see all of the deer!
 
I'm kinda trying to learn Spanish, cause sooo many people here speak that. I'm really only using it for work that way Spanish people can stop getting mad at me when I say 'no habla Espa?ol' then continue to talk to me in Spanish. True story. I think he wanted toothpaste? But he came up to the bakery counter soooo...

It really helps that there is a Spanish speaking woman at work, so I occasionally ask her how to say stuff. Because I'm actually using this Spanish, compared to the 2 years I took back in middle school, I'm retaining it more, and customers -for the most part- seem to understand me. Even thou those 2 years I retained nearly nothin, I can read and speak -for the most part- Spanish correctly, pronouncing vowels and the such right. I can translate stuff I already know, like ?De donde el ba?o? -those words will save your life one day ;) -into rough and literal translations, and I can say basic simple sentences. I still need lots of practice before I can even call myself Spanish speaking, but using it with people reallly helps. Sometimes they'll correct me if I say pequeno or pocito -meaning small.
 
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I'm kinda trying to learn Spanish, cause sooo many people here speak that. I'm really only using it for work that way Spanish people can stop getting mad at me when I say 'no habla Espa?ol' then continue to talk to me in Spanish. True story. I think he wanted toothpaste? But he came up to the bakery counter soooo...

It really helps that there is a Spanish speaking woman at work, so I occasionally ask her how to say stuff. Because I'm actually using this Spanish, compared to the 2 years I took back in middle school, I'm retaining it more, and customers -for the most part- seem to understand me. Even thou those 2 years I retained nearly nothin, I can read and speak -for the most part- Spanish correctly, pronouncing vowels and the such right. I can translate stuff I already know, like ?De donde el ba?o? -those words will save your life one day ;) -into rough and literal translations, and I can say basic simple sentences. I still need lots of practice before I can even call myself Spanish speaking, but using it with people reallly helps. Sometimes they'll correct me if I say pequeno or pocito -meaning small.

Spanish is a really useful language, and the fact that you have someone so close to you that can help you learn is great! The more you use a language, the better you're going to get at it, so it's great that you have so many opportunities to use Spanish! Do you do anything else to study, like read books or do worksheets or flashcards? Or is it mainly speaking with people at work that helps you retain information?
 
I've self-taught myself Japanese ever since I was 10 years old, for a few years. I even taught myself like 3/4ths of the everyday use kanji. (There's like 2,100 and something if I'm not mistaken) However, I haven't really been making use of it for a while and I'm slowly starting to forget it. :/
I'm thinking of getting back into it tbh but I don't know if I'll ever go to Japan (learning Japanese without going to Japan is a really tedious and time-consuming task which I just don't feel like I can accomplish) so I'm just waiting on it atm.
 
Mainly for speaking with people at work, like doing simple orders. I mean learning more would only benefit me, incase another job I get isn't food service related, so all my food service related phrases go out the window.

Sometimes I look up the info, but Spanish is one of those languages were one word could be said like this, or like that. Like pocito and pequeno. I'm pretty sure both mean small, and I've said both to customers before, but only one has said it's the other. It really depends on what region they are from, since different regions have different words. So even thou Google is easy, it's probably not the most accurate. Then there's 'street Spanish' which I think I've never talked in? As far as I know, it's less formal and doesn't care as much about the verbs compared to the Spanish I was taught in school.
 
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I've self-taught myself Japanese ever since I was 10 years old, for a few years. I even taught myself like 3/4ths of the everyday use kanji. (There's like 2,100 and something if I'm not mistaken) However, I haven't really been making use of it for a while and I'm slowly starting to forget it. :/
I'm thinking of getting back into it tbh but I don't know if I'll ever go to Japan (learning Japanese without going to Japan is a really tedious and time-consuming task which I just don't feel like I can accomplish) so I'm just waiting on it atm.

That's a lot of effort and work, though! You've already learned so much, it seems like such a waste to just let yourself forget it rather than keep practicing. There are many uses for it, such as reading books or understanding films without the use of subtitles!

Mainly for speaking with people at work, like doing simple orders. I mean learning more would only benefit me, incase another job I get isn't food service related, so all my food service related phrases go out the window.

Sometimes I look up the info, but Spanish is one of those languages were one word could be said like this, or like that. Like pocito and pequeno. I'm pretty sure both mean small, and I've said both to customers before, but only one has said it's the other. It really depends on what region they are from, since different regions have different words. So even thou Google is easy, it's probably not the most accurate. Then there's 'street Spanish' which I think I've never talked in? As far as I know, it's less formal and doesn't care as much about the verbs compared to the Spanish I was taught in school.

I understand! I took German for a while in high school since my grandmother is German, and she told me that all of what I learned was very "school" German, not really what you would hear from kids my age when walking down the street. When you factor in things like that and region-specific words/slang/pronunciation, it does seem to add an extreme amount of work to language learning.
 
I'm kinda trying to learn Spanish, cause sooo many people here speak that. I'm really only using it for work that way Spanish people can stop getting mad at me when I say 'no habla Espa?ol' then continue to talk to me in Spanish. True story. I think he wanted toothpaste? But he came up to the bakery counter soooo...

It really helps that there is a Spanish speaking woman at work, so I occasionally ask her how to say stuff. Because I'm actually using this Spanish, compared to the 2 years I took back in middle school, I'm retaining it more, and customers -for the most part- seem to understand me. Even thou those 2 years I retained nearly nothin, I can read and speak -for the most part- Spanish correctly, pronouncing vowels and the such right. I can translate stuff I already know, like ?De donde el ba?o? -those words will save your life one day ;) -into rough and literal translations, and I can say basic simple sentences. I still need lots of practice before I can even call myself Spanish speaking, but using it with people reallly helps. Sometimes they'll correct me if I say pequeno or pocito -meaning small.

When I worked at an amusement park, a lot of people visited that spoke Spanish. My problem is I can usually understand the question they are asking, but I wasn't sure how to give them the answer in Spanish. I learned some random phrases like to the right or left to help with directions.
 
I'm learning French and also trying to learn a bit of Yoruba, since my parents speak that.
 
English and Portuguese are my first languages, though I can?t speak Portuguese well, but I can read and understand it well, and I try to get my mom to speak it to me. I?m trying to learn Tahitian, Hawaiian, and French mostly (a little bit of other languages too). I?m trying to learn Tahitian and French because I?d like to live in French Polynesia. I like all the Polynesian languages which is why I?m trying to learn Hawaiian (and a little Samoan). I?d like to learn Cantonese, Mandarin, Hakka, Hindi, Sanskrit, Pali, Persian, Arabic, Coptic, Quechua, Nahuatl, Indonesian, Javanese, Balinese, Samoan, Tongan, Tuamotuan, Rapa Nui, Turkish, Middle Chinese, Wu, Tibetan, Sichuanese, Italian, Greek, Cherokee, Catalan, Berber, Mozarabic, Maori, Japanese, and Fijian. But maybe that?s too much, maybe if I try hard enough though.
 
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I'm learning French and also trying to learn a bit of Yoruba, since my parents speak that.

Oh, Yoruba! That's great that your parents speak it, I'm sure that they'd be glad to help you! :)

English and Portuguese are my first languages, though I can?t speak Portuguese well, but I can read and understand it well, and I try to get my mom to speak it to me. I?m trying to learn Tahitian, Hawaiian, and French mostly (a little bit of other languages too). I?m trying to learn Tahitian and French because I?d like to live in French Polynesia. I like all the Polynesian languages which is why I?m trying to learn Hawaiian (and a little Samoan). I?d like to learn Cantonese, Mandarin, Hakka, Hindi, Sanskrit, Pali, Persian, Arabic, Coptic, Quechua, Nahuatl, Indonesian, Javanese, Balinese, Samoan, Tongan, Tuamotuan, Rapa Nui, Turkish, Middle Chinese, Wu, Tibetan, Sichuanese, Italian, Greek, Cherokee, Catalan, Berber, Mozarabic, Maori, Japanese, and Fijian. But maybe that?s too much, maybe if I try hard enough though.

That is a lot of languages! Is there any particular reason that you would like to learn all of those? Do you just like learning languages? I know a little bit of German, French, Russian, and now Japanese. I'm far from fluent in any of them, but I know a enough to ask basic questions, get directions, and simple small travel stuff like that.
 
I'm learning Spanish in school right now. While my reading comprehension and writing are pretty good, I still tend to have trouble with a lack of vocabulary, speaking, and sometimes listening. And since English is my only language, I have no experience speaking two languages fluently.
 
I'm learning Spanish in school right now. While my reading comprehension and writing are pretty good, I still tend to have trouble with a lack of vocabulary, speaking, and sometimes listening. And since English is my only language, I have no experience speaking two languages fluently.

The biggest thing that I find a challenge with learning languages is not having the right vocab can be frustrating when you're speaking or writing and attempting to get a specific point across!
 
My native language is English. I studied Spanish for 5 years in school, but unfortunately I don't have anyone to speak Spanish with so it's a struggle to maintain it. However, I still practice by listening to Spanish (movies and music) and reading it on signs, instruction manuals, magazines, etc., so I can still understand a good amount. I've just lost the ability to put together more than the most basic of sentences.

I'm also working on self-teaching myself Japanese. I have a natural ear for other languages and pick up commonly used words and phrases just by listening, so I watch a lot of Japanese movies and anime and listen to Japanese music. Then, I look up the words that pop out to me. I've built up quite a vocabulary that way. I also learned the sentence structure which helps me figure out more of the words that I hear through process of elimination and educational guesses. Plus I can put together basic sentences. I've learned the hiragana and some of the katakana and a few kanji, but I'm focusing more on the spoken language versus the written. My goal is to be able to watch something in Japanese without subtitles one day.
 
My native language is English. I studied Spanish for 5 years in school, but unfortunately I don't have anyone to speak Spanish with so it's a struggle to maintain it. However, I still practice by listening to Spanish (movies and music) and reading it on signs, instruction manuals, magazines, etc., so I can still understand a good amount. I've just lost the ability to put together more than the most basic of sentences.

I'm also working on self-teaching myself Japanese. I have a natural ear for other languages and pick up commonly used words and phrases just by listening, so I watch a lot of Japanese movies and anime and listen to Japanese music. Then, I look up the words that pop out to me. I've built up quite a vocabulary that way. I also learned the sentence structure which helps me figure out more of the words that I hear through process of elimination and educational guesses. Plus I can put together basic sentences. I've learned the hiragana and some of the katakana and a few kanji, but I'm focusing more on the spoken language versus the written. My goal is to be able to watch something in Japanese without subtitles one day.

I just signed up for this app (it's for iPhone or android phones) called Hello Talk! You choose your target language, and you can chat and post statuses that native speakers will correct! It's pretty neat.

That's a good goal! I love to watch movies and anime, but if something else grabs my attention then I have to always rewind because I'm not sure if I understood what has been said. I do better on written versus listening, something that I'm hoping to improve!
 
I've been using the classic duolingo to learn Spanish.

I attempt to learn Korean but every time I try I just like stop after a while
 
I grew up speaking English and Korean. Since I was born and raised in Korea, speaking it is fine for me... but I went to an English schooling system my whole life so I didn't formally learn Korean grammar or writing despite living there. I don't speak Korean so much now since I don't live there anymore, only to communicate with my mom and grandma... so I'm a little rusty. But I always feel like I pick it up right away when I go back to Korea. It's not really much help to say you should go to the country to learn the language (it's not an option for most people) but I do feel like that's the best way, basically to surround yourself with people who speak the language. Sometimes I use an app called HelloTalk which is pretty useful. Basically you talk to people of that language you want to learn while you help them with English or whatever language they are learning (which is 90% english so it's a win win lol). It's helpful because the app's messaging system has a function where the person you're speaking to can correct you if you say/write something incorrectly, which is a great help for me since writing is my weakness. There's also a direct translation button for things you see on your stream/people you follow. It has a voice app feature too. I'd say that app is pretty good besides a few bugs but yeah it helped me a lot when I was trying to get back into Korean.

Currently I'm learning Khmer since it's my dad's mother tongue and I'm living in Cambodia for the indefinite future. I'm getting in the habit of keeping a journal of things I hear/say regularly and translating them into Korean and Khmer, plus writing out sentences using those words. My pronunciation sucks and a lot of the times I'm just stringing together words but for the most part people get what I'm trying to say so I guess that's good lol. I do plan on getting a proper tutor soon but I've been swamped with work so I have to make do with learning by ear for now.

edit -

I only just now read that OP knows of the app. So here's my post saying I vouch for it!
 
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itook two languages in school (french and german) they went really well for maybe the first 2 years but i completely lost track when i stopped going. i would like to learn them again maybe take an online course at some point
 
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