Some life-shattering revelations about language learning and life

I'm growing...

Dear people,

Today is my birthday and I’m excited. And scared. And excited. I guess it’s just a time of heightened emotions. The more scared you are the more excited you are.

I’m excited because Maya baked me a cake and got me two candles (4 and 3) that she bought with her very own pocket money. Because she hid a package in the fridge that said “THIS IS YOUR PRESENT MOMY DONT TOCH IT” and upon unwrapping it today it turned out it was her favorite kind of chocolate.

I’m excited because before I blew out the two candles 4 and 3 my teenager glumly requested a selfie with me because, he said “I’ve known you all my life.”

I’m excited because as of this moment I’m still breathing. Albeit nervously but breathing. I’m excited because of the number 12. I’m learning 12 languages in 12 months, and my birthday is August 12th and I got my first dog when I was 12 years old, and my locker number in the Soviet kindergarten was also number 12. See? 12 is the lucky number.

And since I haven’t done anything interesting this past week other than continue to stock our safe room with an ever increasing variety of canned food, I’m going to write a review of sorts of what it’s like to be learning too many languages at this fragile time in history.

Like seven new friends

In a nutshell, it’s like meeting seven new interesting people in a short period. Can you know and like all of them equally? Of course not.

Maybe one or two of them will become your close friends. Maybe a third one is a friend from your Crossfit gym who you’ve known for years but have never seen in non-workout clothes. One is a highschool friend who you mostly lost touch with.

There is one who you see every morning on your dog walk and your dogs are friends but you only know her name and nothing else.

And then there is that one-night-stand guy.

Māori was my one-night stand guy. I didn’t learn that much Māori. Maybe I’ll learn more later but I don’t feel a pressing need to do so at the moment.

Finnish is that high school friend who I haven’t been in touch with in a long time and I don’t know if we have much in common anymore.

Rusyn — I know his whole family well, I went to school with his sisters, and I feel like I know him because he looks so much like them, but obviously, he’s a separate person that I know only superficially.

Swahili is a good friend of mine. I sometimes read stories in Swahili and by that I mean that I have to look up almost every word in a dictionary but I don’t mind because it’s fun. My friend Edith speaks Swahili and we sometimes exchange texts in this language, but because we already have two other shared languages it would be weird to suddenly switch to Swahili. Weird and impractical.

For instance, we decided that we want to do a Dead Sea run in February except that she wants us to do 21K and I think 10K will be enough, and if I tried to convey my point in Swahili she would definitely win this argument and I would have only myself to blame.

One day I want to be close friends with Arabic, Thai, and Portuguese (and these are the only languages I listen anything in). Thai — because I enjoy speaking and hearing a tonal language, Portuguese — because it has these nasal vowels that make you sound and feel like a three-year-old with an adenoid problem (minha mãe ‘my mom’ is the cutest phrase ever) and Arabic — because he’s like that guy at work who you always found off-putting, until one day the two of you got slightly drunk and he told you his whole life story and you discovered a deep and interesting person that you just can’t get enough of.

No plan

For the most part, I feel like Cheryl Strayed who went hiking the Pacific Trail with an oversized backpack and very little preparation.

I hadn’t planned it very well. It took about two minutes to decide to go on this journey, and a couple of hours to write the post telling the world about it. I didn’t know what languages I would learn (I still don’t) I had no idea what apps and resources were out there. I know a little more now.

If I were to do it properly, I would have reviewed the latest theories of second language acquisition and conducted in-depth research on the available apps and language resources.

I would have also made sure not to schedule any major life events during this crucial year of my personal development. Wars, sick children, and rapidly aging parents would have to wait.

But because of my reckless lack of planning, I’m dealing with everything at once.

I have no idea if I’ll be able to stick to the plan and learn 5 more languages by the end of the year.

If I don’t — oh well…

If I don’t, it is my sincere birthday wish that it be our biggest problem for the next year (or ten.)