Whining-- and then all is made clear.

[jedishampoo]

It's been so long since I'd taken a foreign language, I'd forgotten how frustrating it can be. :) Having a new alphabet to learn-- hiragana-- wasn't too hard: flashcards! But listening to spoken Japanese and speaking it was confusing as hell to me. I keep trying to speak FRENCH in Japanese class. Why is this? I used to be fluent in French but it's been 16 years since I took it! Does your brain have a "foreign-language" center that kicks into gear when needed or something? ;)

Last night I was so frustrated doing my homework that I got a headache-- we had to write countless sentences about eight different people, and what nationality they were, what university they went to and what year, and what their majors were. I SO DON'T CARE. My poor roommate, sharpeslass. She had to hear it all and hear me grating every sentence out and cursing (in English) when I forgot the "wa" or the "no."

But this morning, when I listened to my Japanese language CD that came with the textbook, I actually knew what they were saying! It was no longer gibberish to me! The conversations made sense! OK fine. So writing out the repetitive sentences seemed to work. My teacher knows what she's doing.

Ohayou Gozaimasu! :)

Comments

[scribblesinink]

Does your brain have a "foreign-language" center that kicks into gear when needed or something? ;)

Hmm. That would explain why English is the only thing that comes out when I need to speak German.

And wow, you're studying Japanese!

[jedishampoo.livejournal.com]

LOL! I guess if there's "dedicated brain space" then it makes sense. At least German and English are very close in some ways, so maybe your way works? ;) I just hate feeling dumb in class when I say "oui" when I should be saying "hai."

So how many languages do you know? I remember thinking I would never have thought you were not a native English speaker. :)

[scribblesinink]

So how many languages do you know?

I'd say, two-and-a-half :-) My mother tongue, of course, and English. As long as people do not require me to translate from one into the other, because I really, really hate doing that, it's too hard! And I can get by in German (though understanding it is much easier than speaking...).

[rosiewook.livejournal.com]

You'll need to check with our foreign language teacher, but I do believe that it's one particular area of the brain that learns and accesses speech.

When I took a Spanish course in college, I completely blanked on vocabulary while taking my final. So I used French vocabulary words to show that I at least new the grammar rules. My professor was so amused, he gave me an A, anyway!

Good for you for expanding your mind.

[jedishampoo.livejournal.com]

Hey, at least French and Spanish are very close, being Latinized languages and all! :) That's how I can translate what little Spanish I can when I read signs-- having studied French.

That's pretty cool, that you pulled an "A" out of that one. I doubt my Japanese teacher will be so understanding. She's very nice. But when we write words she wants them done a certain way. I've seen too much Japanese stuff, 'cause I write my letters like they do in some of my doujinshi (Japanese fan comics)-- and she warned me that writing that way was considered "cute." LOL!

[hollywdliz.livejournal.com]

Yav always jokes that her brain has two settings: "English" and "Other." "Other" is whatever language you learned first, which is why Yav kept trying to speak Spanish in Tunisia and why I kept trying to speak French in Mexico! You get past it, though.

[yav-14.livejournal.com]

That is so true! More times than I count in Switzerland I'd be going along in German and get to a place where I didn't know the words and switch seamlessly to Spanish. You will get past it though. Just keep at it.

[raykel.livejournal.com]

I was going to say the same thing Liz and Yav said. I used to be nearly fluent in American Sign Language and have some knowledge of French, so when I was in Italy I caught myself trying to ask where they bathroom is by saying "Ou est la salle da baines?" while simultaneously signing the ASL for "where." LOL!

[jedishampoo.livejournal.com]

Oh man, that's hysterical! So voiced language doesn't have a monopoly on the brain wiring?

Anyway, I'm certainly glad to know that I'm not the only one. I really felt stupid slipping into French. I figured that when I didn't know a word I'd substitute English but that ain't so. :)

[raykel.livejournal.com]

Yeah, sign language fits into that "other" category same as spoken languages. I suspect the reason this happens is because unless you're so fluent in another langauge that you actually think in it, you're pretty much thinking in your native language and trying to translate into the other language. So you think "Where is the bathroom?" and start to try and translate, and the first thing that's going to come up is the language you most frequently translate into. (For me, ASL first and French second.)

[sharpiefan.livejournal.com]

I remember one year in secondary school, I had French, Latin, Spanish and English lessons one after the other. And one day in Spanish, I kept trying to count in Latin and couldn't figure out why my teacher was telling me I was wrong! 'Unos, dos, tres, quattuor' not 'Uno, dos, tres, quatro'.

[jedishampoo.livejournal.com]

Holy smokes! And all those languages are sooo very similar, I can certainly understand it. Actually, I don't know how you kept them separate AT ALL in those circumstances!

[nmissi.livejournal.com]

I know what you mean. There does seem to be some mental switch that flips and activates your "foreign language" center. Mine runs my spanish and french all together entirely too often. But having never tried (well, not seriously) a nonlatin language, I don't know how it would be with something like japanese.