[Heart Break Kid]

(07-10-2017 12:00 PM)FFL Wrote:  

I speak English, Russian and French fluently and Spanish conversationally, Russian I picked up as a kid due to my mom and dad being Russian and I feel like it would be tough becoming conversational in it in a matter of a couple of years, even using it a lot in the house. I still had a private tutor for several hours a week growing up for many years. Not trying to discourage one from learning it by any means, just saying it's a very difficult one for your first attempt at learning a foreign language unless you're willing to commit to spending a considerable amount of time in some language immersion program in Russia. I also want to note many Russians speak shitty Russian adding to it's difficulties. I've been to areas in Russia where I struggled with the local dialect. I also struggle in Ukraine sometimes which is why I'm going over in October to do a 50 week language immersion program in Kiev. The whole program is $2900 usd for all 50 weeks and that includes room and board (although I will not be using the student housing which will make the full program $2,250 roughly) I'll also add the cut off for a student visa in Ukraine is age 35 but I'm sure you could get around this somehow. They have the same program for Russian as well if you're interested in learning more about it PM me I did months of research on this.

I learned French by force doing 5 years in the Foreign Legion and by the end of my first year I was conversational and I'd say fluent by the end of my 2nd year. I thought French was pretty easy and would think other people that learned it as adults would agree. Also very useful in Africa and many other European countries.

Spanish I picked up working in the service industry in Miami I'd say it's a great first 2nd language that can be picked up pretty quickly, I've thought recently into putting in the effort to become fluent but conversational has proven to be more than enough whenever I've needed it.

One thing I like about French and Spanish is they have both proven useful in a lot of ways other than in Spanish or French speaking areas. I've been to places where my English was no good but was able to communicate in Spanish or French because they are common 2nd languages a lot of people pick up in other parts of the world. I would think Italian would also fit into this box. But with a language like Spanish you have so many doors open to languages like Italian, Romanian, Portuguese ect... which become unequivocally easier to learn knowing Spanish.

I would think learning Arabic and Chinese would be pretty clutch and I'm sure would open some serious professional doors not to mention govt contracting jobs, but I'd guess like Russian they would be a very serious commitment just to get past the vocab of a toddler.

Here is a interesting article about language learning by difficulty http://aboutworldlanguages.com/language-difficulty

I would have loved to have learned French for my last semester at Uni, but the textbook was super expensive - and teaching English in China seems like a pretty sure fire way to get out of the country with little qualifications.

Not sure how good I can get at speaking with only a few months at home and a year in China. It'll be an interesting test. Ideally, Portuguese or French would be better ROI for a traveler who has interest in Africa. (which I'd love to dive into)

[Suits]

(07-10-2017 02:31 PM)Heart Break Kid Wrote:  

Teaching English in China seems like a pretty sure fire way to get out of the country with little qualifications.

Not sure how good I can get at speaking with only a few months at home and a year in China. It'll be an interesting test.

Theoretically, Chinese can and has been learned to fluency in a year's time. African and Indian students do it all the time before starting a four year degree program taught in Chinese.

But you're not going to. Teaching English (or otherwise working in China) is a great path to not learning Chinese.

If you want to learn Chinese, come as a student, enroll in a good language program and go out and try to talk to ordinary people every day.

[Heart Break Kid]

(07-11-2017 06:29 PM)Suits Wrote:  

(07-10-2017 02:31 PM)Heart Break Kid Wrote:  

Teaching English in China seems like a pretty sure fire way to get out of the country with little qualifications.

Not sure how good I can get at speaking with only a few months at home and a year in China. It'll be an interesting test.

Theoretically, Chinese can and has been learned to fluency in a year's time. African and Indian students do it all the time before starting a four year degree program taught in Chinese.

But you're not going to. Teaching English (or otherwise working in China) is a great path to not learning Chinese.

If you want to learn Chinese, come as a student, enroll in a good language program and go out and try to talk to ordinary people every day.

They become literate in one year?

[FFL]

(07-11-2017 06:29 PM)Suits Wrote:  

(07-10-2017 02:31 PM)Heart Break Kid Wrote:  

Teaching English in China seems like a pretty sure fire way to get out of the country with little qualifications.

Not sure how good I can get at speaking with only a few months at home and a year in China. It'll be an interesting test.

Theoretically, Chinese can and has been learned to fluency in a year's time. African and Indian students do it all the time before starting a four year degree program taught in Chinese.

But you're not going to. Teaching English (or otherwise working in China) is a great path to not learning Chinese.

If you want to learn Chinese, come as a student, enroll in a good language program and go out and try to talk to ordinary people every day.

That's solid advice, I'm basically doing the same thing with Ukrainian in Kiev, I'll be in a 50 week program that was built for foreign students looking to attend university in Ukraine. Although theirs will be 800 hours group + 500 hours private Russian and 1 - 2 hours per day Ukrainian I reversed it as I need the Ukrainian and substituted Russian grammar and writing.

Like suit said get into a program like that in China, I'll bet they have better ones than what I'm attending for my choice.

Best to just sacrifice a year of your life. It'll pay off in the end. Just don't plan to have a life for a year and dig in. No big deal, it'll pay life long dividends.

I remember how much I hated my parents forcing me into Russian and I can tell you at 32 I'm very grateful now. Honestly I wish I had spent the better part of my early 20's just traveling every year to a new language school each year and teaching English on the side. Careers and Businesses are easy to start in your 30's especially with language skills and life experiences.

[Kelent]

(07-11-2017 06:29 PM)Suits Wrote:  

(07-10-2017 02:31 PM)Heart Break Kid Wrote:  

Teaching English in China seems like a pretty sure fire way to get out of the country with little qualifications.

Not sure how good I can get at speaking with only a few months at home and a year in China. It'll be an interesting test.

Theoretically, Chinese can and has been learned to fluency in a year's time. African and Indian students do it all the time before starting a four year degree program taught in Chinese.

But you're not going to. Teaching English (or otherwise working in China) is a great path to not learning Chinese.

If you want to learn Chinese, come as a student, enroll in a good language program and go out and try to talk to ordinary people every day.

Have you heard about the YouTube channel Serpentza? He's a South African guy living in China, has been for.. I think almost a decade, and he's basically fluent. Really interesting stuff.

[Suits]

(07-11-2017 08:00 PM)Kelent Wrote:  

(07-11-2017 06:29 PM)Suits Wrote:  

(07-10-2017 02:31 PM)Heart Break Kid Wrote:  

Teaching English in China seems like a pretty sure fire way to get out of the country with little qualifications.

Not sure how good I can get at speaking with only a few months at home and a year in China. It'll be an interesting test.

Theoretically, Chinese can and has been learned to fluency in a year's time. African and Indian students do it all the time before starting a four year degree program taught in Chinese.

But you're not going to. Teaching English (or otherwise working in China) is a great path to not learning Chinese.

If you want to learn Chinese, come as a student, enroll in a good language program and go out and try to talk to ordinary people every day.

Have you heard about the YouTube channel Serpentza? He's a South African guy living in China, has been for.. I think almost a decade, and he's basically fluent. Really interesting stuff.

He's a South African guy who has been exaggerating his success for about a decade now.

[ball dont lie]

(07-11-2017 06:29 PM)Suits Wrote:  

(07-10-2017 02:31 PM)Heart Break Kid Wrote:  

Teaching English in China seems like a pretty sure fire way to get out of the country with little qualifications.

Not sure how good I can get at speaking with only a few months at home and a year in China. It'll be an interesting test.

Theoretically, Chinese can and has been learned to fluency in a year's time. African and Indian students do it all the time before starting a four year degree program taught in Chinese.

But you're not going to. Teaching English (or otherwise working in China) is a great path to not learning Chinese.

If you want to learn Chinese, come as a student, enroll in a good language program and go out and try to talk to ordinary people every day.

While I understand that some students do pass the HSK in one year and go onto their undergraduate degree their level of Chinese is still really very low. They don't understand anything that is happening in the class and do all their coursework in English generally. The HSK changed since I took it a decade ago and has a different level system so I don't know what level exactly they are when they finish in a year.

I can say from meeting hundreds of foreign students: I haven't met anyone who was good at Chinese after a year. I have met a few people who were good after 2-3 years and they were the kind of weirdo people who study 6-8 hours a day and always speak Chinese. Our definitions of good might be different.

One thing that helps to think clearly about language. Ive met countless foreigners who shit on Chinese people for their poor English while those Chinese people are using complex sentence structures and a decent vocabulary. Pronunciation had some issues as well. Westerners generally shit on those Chinese people saying their language ability sucks. I almost never meet any non-Chinese who have a good Chinese vocabulary, know the chengyu/idioms, have good pronunciation. Yet I hear all the time that somebody is "fluent". I think what is going on is that people have wildly high opinions of themselves.

[Suits]

(07-11-2017 11:45 PM)ball dont lie Wrote:  

(07-11-2017 06:29 PM)Suits Wrote:  

(07-10-2017 02:31 PM)Heart Break Kid Wrote:  

Teaching English in China seems like a pretty sure fire way to get out of the country with little qualifications.

Not sure how good I can get at speaking with only a few months at home and a year in China. It'll be an interesting test.

Theoretically, Chinese can and has been learned to fluency in a year's time. African and Indian students do it all the time before starting a four year degree program taught in Chinese.

But you're not going to. Teaching English (or otherwise working in China) is a great path to not learning Chinese.

If you want to learn Chinese, come as a student, enroll in a good language program and go out and try to talk to ordinary people every day.

While I understand that some students do pass the HSK in one year and go onto their undergraduate degree their level of Chinese is still really very low. They don't understand anything that is happening in the class and do all their coursework in English generally. The HSK changed since I took it a decade ago and has a different level system so I don't know what level exactly they are when they finish in a year.

I can say from meeting hundreds of foreign students: I haven't met anyone who was good at Chinese after a year. I have met a few people who were good after 2-3 years and they were the kind of weirdo people who study 6-8 hours a day and always speak Chinese. Our definitions of good might be different.

One thing that helps to think clearly about language. Ive met countless foreigners who shit on Chinese people for their poor English while those Chinese people are using complex sentence structures and a decent vocabulary. Pronunciation had some issues as well. Westerners generally shit on those Chinese people saying their language ability sucks. I almost never meet any non-Chinese who have a good Chinese vocabulary, know the chengyu/idioms, have good pronunciation. Yet I hear all the time that somebody is "fluent". I think what is going on is that people have wildly high opinions of themselves.

I generally see Chinese as a language that can be learned to a comfortably functional level in two years.

I've met people with respectable spoken Chinese who don't study like madmen.

The general rule I've seen in place is that just about no one learns it and no matter how much you achieve in a year, there is still room for growth.

Based on the research I'm currently conducting, I'm fairly certain that any language could be learned much faster and easier than it is usually learned. No one seems to know how to teach Chinese to non-Chinese.

Very few people seem to know how to teach any language efficiently. The secret to success is practice, but I've never seen a language school or program that effectively incorporates this. Plenty try, none succeed.

You can't just say, "OK, now practice" and expect students to succeed. You need a structure designed to make practice effective.

Most people learn because of the practice they get OUTSIDE of class because instructors are useless beyond teaching grammar and handing out books that have vocabulary lists.

[Ouroboros]

I think Indonesian is a very underrated language. For gaming purposes, it's the language of a pussy paradise with 260 million people. For business purposes, it's projected that Indonesia will be the 5th largest economy by 2030, and the 4th largest by 2050 (overtaking Japan and every European country). If you know Indonesian you will understand Malay, opening up Malaysia and Singapore, two other important economies (admittedly many people in those countries already speak English, but there are advantages to knowing one of their native languages). In terms of easiness, it might be the easiest Asian language to learn, with simple grammar, no tones, and no difficult scripture or characters to learn (it uses the Latin alphabet). It's also a friendly country where foreigners (particularly bule) are popular.
Some might argue that you can game and work in Indonesia only knowing English, which is true. But you can increasingly do that in most countries anyway, given the lingua franca status of English. You can easily make the same argument about Chinese or German. Knowing the native language would help make you stand out (since so few people currently learn it) and magnify your success, productivity and options.

[Heart Break Kid]

(08-02-2017 08:27 PM)Ouroboros Wrote:  

I think Indonesian is a very underrated language. For gaming purposes, it's the language of a pussy paradise with 260 million people. For business purposes, it's projected that Indonesia will be the 5th largest economy by 2030, and the 4th largest by 2050 (overtaking Japan and every European country). If you know Indonesian you will understand Malay, opening up Malaysia and Singapore, two other important economies (admittedly many people in those countries already speak English, but there are advantages to knowing one of their native languages). In terms of easiness, it might be the easiest Asian language to learn, with simple grammar, no tones, and no difficult scripture or characters to learn (it uses the Latin alphabet). It's also a friendly country where foreigners (particularly bule) are popular.
Some might argue that you can game and work in Indonesia only knowing English, which is true. But you can increasingly do that in most countries anyway, given the lingua franca status of English. You can easily make the same argument about Chinese or German. Knowing the native language would help make you stand out (since so few people currently learn it) and magnify your success, productivity and options.

I agree 100%. Very easy language to pick up, and as you said Indonesia is developing at a fast rate.

[shane.shepherd]

In terms of coverage:

1. Mandarin
2. English
3. Spanish

In terms of business:

1. English
2. Mandarin
3. German

In terms of women (top quality):

1. English
2. Spanish
3. Russian

[Cr33pin]

(08-03-2017 05:29 PM)shane.shepherd Wrote:  

In terms of coverage:


In terms of women (top quality):

1. English
2. Spanish
3. Russian

[simondice]

Just learn whatever language you want, man.
Happiness is more important than whatever "usefulness" you get out of knowing an "authority" or "important" language.
Very useful advice because everyone mentioned all motives (business, women, career) except self fulfillment

Example:
Have friends who speak 4-7 languages each (English, Spanish, Dutch, Arabic, etc..)
You know what their favorite language usually is?

Usually some dialect only they know from where they're from.

It's the language they prefer, the language that clicks the most with them.

Just like the girls you keep around, the language you learn should be something that makes you happy and gives you the most chemistry.

Check out this video.
They asked these girls what language sounds the most sexy to them.
They had an idea of what sounds "sexy" to them

And than tested what was actually sexy to them and found out something different (women *eyeroll*)

This is for the guy' version

Don't be afraid to be different and learn whatever language gives you "tingles". Even if it's not "cool" or the girls are not "ideal", do it for you

[simondice]

Step one

Listen to these list of languages, without seeing the video (just audio)

Step 2

Write down what number gave you tingles


Step 3

Be surprised which resonated the most with you

[Matrixdude]

^^^


The Norwegian one for sure... Reminds me of this girl that went offline recently. (More in the description of the video)

I don't understand what she says but I can listen to her all day