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 Language Learning Forum : Members profiles |  | |
| sanmusa Newbie United States Joined 4091 days ago 2 posts - 4 votes Speaks: EnglishA1 | Message 1 of 1 03 September 2013 at 2:46pm | IP Logged |
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Hello! I am a new guy here but not a new guy to languages. My name is Renato, born and raised in Brazil, living in the USA since 1993. I've lived in Korea for six years, and now in Germany for the last two years. I am a US Army helicopter mechanic and married to a wonderful Korean woman and father of an even more wonderful 13 month old boy.
I was exposed to foreign languages early in my life, as everybody in my family in Brazil was at least bilingual. My grandmother went to college to learn Classical Languages and she was fluent in Classical Greek, Latin, German, French and Spanish. Her strongest was Classical Greek, she knew that grammar as well as Brazilian Portuguese. I was pretty much the only grandchildren out of over twelve that took an interest in grandma's old language books, and my first exposure to foreign language learning was leafing through the yelowed pages of her books from the 1930s. Grandma taught me some classical Greek, especially the alphabet, and taught me the basics of Latin too. I thought that the fact that people on different countries spoke different languages was amazing, and was interested in learning them. When I got to middle school in Brazil we had the choice of learning a language, and I chose French. I learned that all the way to the end of high school in Brazil. I also started classes after school for German, and my mom figured out of I was interested in learning languages I might as well try English. I hated learning English, but was forced to study it, and it paid off later when I moved to the US. I also bought a bunch of "teach yourself" books on different languages, like Basque, Norwegian, Finnish, Indonesian, Aarabic. Japanese, Russian, etc. I actually didn't learn any of them! but I got a good grasp on how the mechanics of how all those languages worked. That got me involved in conlangs, and I have created a dozen or more languages, two or three of them at a more developed stage. None of them I can really speak. I was also fascinated with different writing systems, and I can "read" Greek, Cyrillic, some Arabic and Hebrew, and Hangul script. I also invented my own alphabet when I was 15, and I have been using it for over 22 years, whenever I need to write something private I do it in my script. I moved to the USA in 1993, and was living in Miami, where I actually learned to speak and Spanish. Before, as a Brazilian, I understood Spanish, but spoke in Portunol. My language acquitision took a break for a few years, and that was when I developed most of my colangs. A few years later I was in the Army and got orders to go to South Korea, which sparked that language bug again. I bought a simple tourist book for Korean phrases, another book called " Teahc yourself Hangul in two weeks", and by the time I arrived in Seoul I could already read the language, say hello, ask for directions, etc. I married a Korean two years after I got there, which led to me getting more daily expsoure to the language. AT work (Army) it was English only, but at home we watched the news and the wife also watched soap operas 24/7 in Korean, so I developed a good ear for the language. I am by no means fluent in the language, but I can make small talk with natives, can pick up the main topics when I get the news whether in print, radio or TV. I love Korean language, and I am always slowly learning it, undortunately I am now in Germany and getting little exposure to the it outside the home. Our little boy is getting taught Konglish at home, as my wife speaks to him in Korean and I do Konglish and some Portuguese. He'll learn proper English when he goes to school. Now I am in Germany and have been relearning all the German I used to know before. My German is an advanced pidgin, as I pay little attention to proper grammar, pronounce most articles as "de", and concentrate on vocabulary acquisition, and understanding and being understood. My broken German does very well and I can converse with Germans that don't speak English. I say that my biggest asset in language acquisition is a good ear for picking up sounds. Whichever language I learn I usually learn to speak pretty close to native fairly quick, which leads to funny moments, like in Korea when some Koreans think I speak perfect Korean because of my pronuncioation and just go full native with me, and then I have to say " chalmotheayo!" (I can't speak it well!). My language inventory right now: English, Portuguese - native fluency Spanish, French - very goof fluency Italian, Korean - good listening and reading, some speech German - good pidgin level Russian, Lebanese and Egyptian Arabic - some speech 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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