17 Comments

" In my near euphoria, I began to imagine that the snowflakes were individual Chinese characters floating faintly down, settling with benign indifference upon the good learner and the bad. " I love it - I could see it and feel it and agree with your euphoria!

"Pic under roof = home". My husband has revised that to "everyone eating pork (diner) together under a roof = family" :)

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Thank you! and yes, a family sitting down to dinner together under one roof makes more sense these days, doesn't it?

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I LOVED this. So fun and funny and thoughtful and fascinating. I've been trying to learn French forever and a day. Right now, I'm trying the "watch TV" method. And I can't understand a single thing in one of the shows I chose to watch (the accent? the pace?). But the other is a little more comprehensible. I think I will be trying to learn French for the rest of my life. :)

Wonderful piece, Jeffrey. :)

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Thank you for your kind words. Yes, learning a language is a lifetime thing, isn't it? Good luck with French! It's the first language I learnt after my native English (it was obligatory at my school) and I love the sound of it.

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I had a boss once who took his holiday in a different country each year. He then spent the year learning the language of that country. It was astonishing how many languages he knew. He was Dutch, so maybe learning different languages (and being surrounded by them) made a difference.

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Wow, I am envious of his ability and enthusiasm!

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Jeffrey, am trying to remember... did you write about red bean paste (and not liking it) in a post? If so, which post? :)

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It's in this post, part 2 of On learning new languages - it comes towards the end of the post.

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!!! Thought it might be this post but missed the reference. Thank you. :)

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This was great, Jeffery.

It so wonderful when the thing we want to learn actually interests us as it makes the whole process so much more enjoyable. And I like how you pointed out at the end that it’s important for us to take responsibility for our own learning and not rely on teachers to do it for us.

In recent years I have been making a real effort to continue learning new things with that same sort of inquisitive and self taught method.

Thanks :)

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Yes, this line: "In my near euphoria, I began to imagine that the snowflakes were individual Chinese characters floating faintly down, settling with benign indifference upon the good learner and the bad." Wonderful.

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Another great piece, Jeffrey. Different thoughts come to mind. The first is a book I read years ago which you’ve probably come across, The Geography of Thought by Nesbitt. The second relates to my daughter’s experience learning Mandarin. She showed no interest in learning languages at school but became interested in Mandarin when she went to China for her gap year. She subsequently went to Beijing Language and Cultural University for her 4-year degree and, in her final year, took part in a Chinese reality TV programme about foreigners learning Chinese in China. She speaks fluently. Like you say, it is motivation that makes the difference. She was very motivated, but also totally immersed in the language and culture. The fact that she had a Chinese boyfriend, now husband, probably has something to do with it 😊.

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Thanks Nicola. I'll check out the Geography of Thought. My kind of book title! Your daughter's experience sounds amazing and yes, it seems to support the point about motivation and language learning.

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Sorry, the author is Richard Nisbett.

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Oh, and I had exactly the same experience with what looked like tasty buns only to find the bean paste inside! And buying what I thought was a carton of milk only to find it was yogurt ... a mistake I believe a lot of foreigners make.

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Thank you ,Michael. And you're so right, learning something we want to learn is a lot more fun! And glad to hear the Curious Platypus is still, well, curious 🙂.

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Thank you. Of course, it's heavily indebted to the ending of "The Dead" by Joyce. I hope I will be forgiven for that.

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