HOW LEARNING LANGUAGES CHANGED THE VIEW OF THE WORLD

How Learning Languages Changed the View of the World

 

 

 

 

 

The link between language learning and how I view the things and the world has been fascinating to me. 

 

Language isn’t just a form of communication.

 

It is also fabricated and woven by culture and history.

 

This is the saddest part how much high school ruins languages for so many people.

 

We hear a lot people say “I took English in high school”.

 

But a few years later, they don’t practice it and they are left with nothing. 

 

Something so beautiful is turned into a subject that they need to complete at school.

And they suffer through it.

 

The experience of learning and mastering a new language is unparalleled.

 

It is nothing like any other subjects at school.

 

That’s my belief that we need to learn other languages to close the gaps that exist between us.

 

So I would like to share my experience learning foreign languages and that it has taken me on.

 

I am going to start from the begging here.

 

I technically come from a monolingual household.

 

 

 

Both of my parents are from Japan.

 

I started to go to school in Japan where I grew up, and where I was born. 

 

All my family members spoke only Japanese including extended family like my cousins.

 

So Japanese was the only language that was present in my life.

 

When I was 15, my father took me a trip to the United States.

 

I remember not being able to understand anything that the local were saying.

 

That became a huge source of frustration and embarrassment.

 

I felt limited.

Not being able to speak the language felt like this massive obstacle,

Blocking me from interacting with so many people that I encountered.

 

Later, due to a long series of events and me desperately trying to study English,

I joined a home stay language-learning program in summer in the United States when I was 16.

 

Having looked back, this was a very pivotal moment in my life.

 

It is difficult for me to describe how formative this experience was for me.

So I went to a new continent.

I was unable to understand practically anything anyone is saying around me.

 

US up to that point was just far off place that I had only had the most superficial understanding of. 

 

All the stereotypes.

 

If you take a moment to think about it, it’s really a limited view of how things really are.

 

I knew that I had to start speaking the language of the people.

 

It was crazy what that was like.

 

People construct their thoughts differently in other languages.

So in a sense, you are learning a new way of thinking.

 

I was tired every day because I was desperately trying to grasp on to what was taking place around me.

But as time passes, my brain started to connect the dots.

 

And little by little I was able to put my thought and feelings into words that were new to my lips.

 

After my tons of embarrassing moments, when I wanted to say something, things started to click.

 

People act in a different way there.

Different facial expressions

Different etiquette

Different body posture

 

What was not once seen before became clearer to me.

 

Language is just a tool.

 

But it was with a language that I could see another vision of history, of the world and of the Japan.

 

It is with a new vision that I can have access to new things.

 

For example,

Music, movies, any contents that local people use.

 

With Spanish, I have cultural access to other parts of the world, not only to Spain, to Ecuador, Chile etc.

 

 

So later, I saved money and I went to China to learn Chinese in 2008.

 

 

China looked so interesting because Japan and China are geographically very close but

They look uniquely different. 

 

So I wanted to find out what it is.

 

Many people consider that Japanese and Chinese are similar language, but they are not. 

 

Grammatically speaking, Chinese is like English or French.

 

Japanese and Chinese only had one of scripts in common.

 

I had not had researched it.

I assumed the same.

 

It was more difficult than I expected.

 

Especially, the pronunciation with four tones was crazy.

 

Since then, I am addicted to learning languages.

Later, I lived in Spain for six years and in France for one month.

 

One of the biggest lessons that I learned is that there is almost more than one way to do things. And there is no a right way or wrong way to do that.

 

For example, some people eat with a knife and fork and on the other parts of the world, people eat with chops sticks.

 

Socialize with people

Prepare food

Sports

 

What blows my mind is that there’s an unlimited number of opportunities to have this kind of experience through learning languages.

 

It's not only Kungfu, or flamenco or pasta or manga.

 

Every time you learn a new language, you run into new things.

 

It is worth learning it.

 

The term of language is used in different forms:

 

Visual languages like film and photography

Code is language

Music is another form of language.

 

These languages are used to close the gaps that exist between us.  

Understandings

 

All of these things that were learned and incorporated into your life are enriching and snowballs what is possible in your present reality.

 

Languages are just ways to connect dots and put meaning into your time, which ultimately removes the existing gaps between us.

 

It is extremely difficult to jump into the unknown world. 

 

Changes come with uncertainty.

And uncertainty is terrifying.

 

I know it is difficult but I guarantee you that it is definitely worth it.

 

It is like taking a cold shower. 

It feels extremely cold at first, but then later, 

you get used to it.

Thanks for reading,

Hilano Aquihisa