Finnish Interlude

It's been awhile since I posted about my language learning, and since I've had some moments that made me excited, I figured I'd share.

Finland is spoken by a grand total of about 5.4 million people and almost all of them live in Finland, so, in some ways, it seems a bit silly to spend time learning Finnish.  After all, once I graduate when on earth will I ever have a chance to use Finnish again?

Cue scene number 1...

I was at the top of the mountain at Plitvice Lakes National Park in Croatia.  I was a bit lost, since after paying a lot of money to get in, I refused to buy a park map for more money on the principle of the thing.  But finally, here at the top, was a map of the park.  I angled over to get a better view, but the map was blocked by a large group of tourists.  As I waited for their tour guide to finish her spiel and move on her way, something started to sound familiar.  I was recognizing words here and there... was she speaking Finnish?  It didn't sound quite right, but she had definitely said some words I recognized.  So, finally, I braved it and turned to the woman next to me and asked, in Finnish, "Are you Finnish?"

Ok, it might not be directly related to the post, but everyone loves photos, right?  These are falls at Plitvice Lakes National Park

Turns out she was Estonian.  They're fairly closely related languages and have a lot of similar vocabulary, much like Spanish and Italian, which is why I'd understood some familiar words, but still didn't feel like the language sounded right.  But anyways, once we'd established that she was Estonian, we continued chatting for a bit- where I was from, why I was alone at the park, why I spoke Finnish.  I'm still not sure if she switched to Finnish, or if those words are similar enough in Estonian that I could just follow what was going on.  All I know for sure is I was speaking something resembling Finnish.  Just when I thought I'd never use Finnish outside of Finland. . .

Cue scene number 2....
It was a beautiful morning on the Camino de Santiago.  We were passing a bed and breakfast when two women came out. This time, there was no mistaking their language.  Finns for sure.  I bravely stopped them to say hello too and introduce myself in Finnish.  My companions on the trail that day were impressed with my multilingual language skills.  I might have even been impressed myself.

And now that I'm back, I'm branching out and trying Finnish in new situations.  I had a first the other day.  I was at the sauna with an international group, but mostly Finns.  At one point, all the Finns had left the sauna to cool down, and when I joined them in the other room, they were all speaking Finnish.  I sat and listened, they forgot I was there, and then when they were getting up to go back in to the sauna, they suddenly remembered me and apologized for continuing to speak Finnish.  "Oh, that's ok", I told them, "you were talking about his apartment, and how much his rent is, and how far it is to bike there. .. "  They looked at me, surprised.  I was surprised too.  I've caught words before in conversations, but this was the first time I ever actually followed what was going on.  Progress my friends, progress.

Letting go of perfection

I had an epiphany the other day.  I was walking down the sidewalk, headed to campus, thinking about my attitude towards language learning.  "I'm not striving for perfection" I thought.  For a recovering perfectionist like myself, that's a pretty big deal.  When I studied Spanish half a lifetime ago, language learning was about studying rules and applying them correctly.  Now, it's all about communication and comprehension.

And the wonderful thing about Germany is, I get lots of practice.  In the seven months I was in Finland, guess how many strangers asked me for directions, or the time, or for any other sort of information?  Ready for it. . .  Zero.

Now Germany, on the other hand, random strangers stop me on the street.  "Does bus 11 go to the train station?"  "Do you know where the children's clinic is?" "Is the train station this direction?" Fortunately, a simple yes or no, with a "left" "right" or "straight" accompanied by (possibly more intelligible) hand signals usually suffices to answer those questions.

Here most of the international students also already speak some German, leaving me at the bottom of the language learning totem pole.  So the other night on a bus with a Colombian, a Romanian, and a girl from Uzbekistan, our common language was German.  My brain can keep up with what they're saying, since they still have a limited vocabulary and use basic grammatical structures, but as I'm slowly dredging up the vocabulary to make some sort of contribution to the conversation, they've already moved on.  Still, at least I'm understanding.  

The other thing Germany has going for it is that people speak slowly here.  You know when you are learning a language, and they give you those fake listening comprehension dialogs to listen to?  The ones where the people speak slowly and enunciate clearly as they say things like "the bread costs 2 euros" or "my sister lives in a house in the center".  I feel like I'm overhearing people being recorded for those dialogs all the time.  Snippets of conversation slip into my consciousness and I'm like, "I understood that!  Are they speaking that slowly and clearly just for the convenience of eavesdropping, beginner level language learners?"  Since that's highly unlikely, I've come to the conclusion that German is just spoken more slowly and clearly than many other languages (and definitely Spanish).

So, here I am, muddling along, making mistakes as I go, but not really caring.  After all, when I was shoe shopping, the shop attendant went to find shoes in my size in the color I wanted when I asked if they had any.  The lady behind the counter handed me a napkin when I asked for it. I garnered some information about Kepler's life while reading signs at the museum.  I can make sure I buy juice with no sugar added.  My German is coming along swimmingly.  Except when it isn't.  Like the time I went shopping for a strapless bra and the saleslady asked if she could help me.  Somehow my vocabulary didn't seem to cover that. . .

Language Soup

To my right, everyone is speaking Chinese.  I eavesdrop unashamedly- when you can only pick out a few words, that's not really even eavesdropping, right?  It's language study.  At least, that's what our group of beginning language learners decided on the train the other week.

The six of us are deep in conversation when the man with the suitcase approaches.  He leans in and asks a question of the man by the window.  The word "Flughafen" (airport) drifts into our consciousness.   A sudden silence descends.  Heads pivot toward the man asking a question, as those across the aisle shift slightly.  We all listen intently.   The spell broken as he walks off, there's some embarrassed laughter.  Random stranger on the bus to Munich- I promise we weren't prying into your personal life.  We were just excited that we understood the word airport and hoping to catch some more juicy details.  You know, like numbers.  We understand those too.


But anyways, back to Chinese.  The Chinese speakers happen to be in my German class.  I sit surrounded by them.  That Chinese that I studied 7 years ago (wait, it can't possibly be that long ago already, can it?) is being stirred up, moved a little closer to the top from where it was buried under Finnish.  Two weeks into class now, I'm emboldened.  I try out random phrases now and then on my classmates- "Is this yours?"  "I don't know." Their delighted response to my rusty Chinese is all the encouragement I need to try another phrase the next day.

A little farther to my left in class, there's a group of 3 from Spain.  I'm writing down the meanings of my German vocabulary words as the teacher is checking homework.  Her response to a question from the Spanish speakers floats over to me.  She's speaking Spanish too.  My mind subconsciously slips into Spanish mode.  When I look at my vocabulary list, I realize I've just translated a word from German into Spanish instead of English.

Finnish however. . .  My brain feels like soup.  All the different languages are mixed up and the words are floating around, lost in there somewhere.  Some of them are easier to find.  The ones I hear and use everyday, they stay floating at the top.  But Finnish- all that vocabulary is stuck on the bottom.  I try to form a simple sentence.  I know the words are there somewhere.  But somehow, I can't seem to find them.  I mentally practice the days of the week, just to keep them fresh in my mind.  Maanantai, tiistai, keskiviikko, wait, what's Thursday? perjantai, lauantai, sunnuntai.  It bugs me for a whole day.  I can't remember Thursday.  Someone finally looks it up for me on their smart phone. Torstai.  Really?  I remember lauantai and keskiviikko, but the one that sounds MOST like it's English equivalent escapes me?

It's a strange experience for me, this language soup I'm in.  But I think, despite my confusion and occasional mental fatigue from a brain that's trying to process any language it can get its hands on, I like it.  

My multilingual life

I go to a Swedish speaking church.  "Why?", you ask. "Don't you live in Finland?"  Why yes, I do. Finland is officially bilingual though.  Until 1809, when this area was taken over by Russia, what is now known as Finland was part of Sweden.  Over simplifying a bit, but historically, the rulers and upper classes spoke Swedish, the peasants spoke Finnish.  Swedish is still the first language of a minority of Finns, about 5% of the population.  They have their own schools (from primary through university) and their own churches.  I just happened to end up at a Swedish speaking church because they translate to English every week, are really friendly, and are close by.  And hey, when you have to pick between 2 languages you don't understand, what difference does it make?

Ok, that was a really long introduction to say, it's amazing what our minds do all by themselves.  See, I'm not studying Swedish at all.  I see it around on signs, and hear it (and its translation) at church, and it has a lot in common with English.  Still, the amount I have learned through that caught me by surprise last Sunday. We had an English speaker, so the sermon was translated from English to Swedish, instead of the reverse. I was listening to the Swedish translation instead of zoning out, cause I'm a language nerd like that, and at one point the translator paused, looking for the right word.  "Helig" (holy) I thought, then nodded in support as that's what she said.  And then I did a double take.  Was I actually trying to translate from English to Swedish?

- - - - -

My sister sent me a link to Duolingo, an online language learning site, the other day.  I'm headed to Germany in March, and the struggle I had filling out the application for enrollment form (WHY on earth don't they just send it in English like all the other forms, or at least include English directions if they want it in German?) was enough to convince me that I should know a bit of German before I go. So, I'm studiously working through the levels. It's fast at the lower levels!  I'm up to level 3 and can now say very useful phrases like "Ich bin eine Frau" (I am a woman) or Die Jungen trinken Wasser. (The boys drink water)

------

My Finnish is slowly progressing.  I moved from Spot books to longer picture books.  I'm currently working on the Finnish version of Zen Shorts- the story is definitely more involved and interesting than Spot.  But it's too hard for me to read at one sitting and makes my head hurt.  :)  

My best Finnish moment came at the bank.  At Finnish banks you generally take a number and wait til it's your turn. An older gentleman sat down next to me as I was waiting.  He asked me what number I had and when I'd gotten there, and then commented on how long I'd been waiting.  I mostly understood him, and showed him the right thing (my ticket, my watch) in response, so I don't think he realized that I don't speak as much Finnish as your average 2 year old.  Finally, he asked me a question I couldn't answer.  So, I had to explain that I don't speak much Finnish.  That didn't deter him though, so we chatted, with me politely nodding even though I only understood a few words here and there, and answering his questions about where I'm from, where I study, and what I study.  It was great because it's one of the few genuine conversations I've had in Finnish outside of class.  "I'll have a hot chocolate please" "That will be 1.80€, Here you are." "Thanks" does not count.  

- - - - -

And then there's Spanish.  There's something about sliding effortlessly back into Spanish that just makes me feel at home.  Spanish language circle has started back up for the semester, and as I sat drinking my hot chocolate (that I ordered in Finnish) and speaking in Spanish with people from around the world, I felt happy that I have something here that links me to my life in Colombia. 

I picked up a book at the library this week in Spanish.  It's a bit harder than the book I'm reading in Finnish.  It's by a favorite author of mine from Barcelona, Carlos Ruiz Zafón.  His book La Sombra del Viento was the first book that drew me in enough that I couldn't put it down, despite the added difficulty of being in Spanish.  (I highly recommend it, it's called The Shadow of the Wind in English) I haven't gotten very far into this one, Marina, but so far it hasn't disappointed.  

- - - -

Oh, and of course, there's also English.  But there's nothing really interesting to say about that.  

The me that I'm becoming

Today, I made myself arepas for breakfast, and then sat and read my Spot books (in Finnish) while I ate.  There was something about that juxtaposition of cultures that got me thinking.  Because for me, making and eating an arepa is more than just cooking and eating.  It's an act of identifying with the Colombian "side" of my identity, connecting with friends far away, remembering- learning to make arepas for the asado (cook out) we had in La Calera with Bibi, the laughter in the kitchen at Luz y Vida as we made breakfast for 30,  the open bag of harina pan that Alex used to pat his arepas into shape, listening to Edwin and his brother and cousin discuss politics around the breakfast table, making arepas rellenas for dinner with Andreina when she came to visit me in the States.

And I realize how much my time in Colombia changed me. Not just in ways that are easy to explain, like memories, and eating new foods.  But things that are so much harder to see, or even for me to identify.  I see the world differently.  I have more than one way of doing things depending on where I am and who I'm with.  My values have shifted.

And now, I'm learning a new language, in a new country, with a new culture. Somewhere in a powerpoint this week, I saw these sentences: "You can't learn a language without learning the culture, and you can't learn a culture without learning the language"  I'd agree, and I'd add that you can't learn a language and culture and remain the same.

My favorite poem pretty much says the same thing-

Aprender el inglés/Learning English  by Luis Alberto Ambroggio

Vida 

Para entenderme 

Tienes que saber español 

Sentirlo en la sangre de tu alma.

Si hablo otro lenguaje

Y uso palabras distintas

Para expresar sentimientos que nunca cambiarán

No sé 

Si seguiré siendo 

La misma persona

Life 

to understand me 

you have to know Spanish 

feel it in the blood of your soul.

If I speak another language

And use different words

For feelings that will always stay the same

I don’t know 

If I’ll continue being 

The same person

And that's what I wonder- who will I be when my time here is done?  How will Finland and everything I do and see and experience and learn here change me?

The really cool thing about language acquisition

My new hobby is reading Spot books.  You know, Spot Goes to School, Spot Can Count, Spot Bakes a Cake.  They expose me to the sort of highly contextualized language it's hard to find naturally when you're an adult, and it's highly contextualized language that aids in language acquisition.  I know this; after all, I taught ESL and studied second language acquisition.  At the same time, I feel slightly ridiculous reading Spot books to myself (even more so when I sit down to read them in the library and the little kids around stare at me with open curiosity.)  After all, I haven't (at least not yet) read through them with a dictionary to figure out what the unknown words mean.  I'm not taking notes, or even quizzing myself on vocabulary.  Am I really learning anything?

Then, today, I had a moment of epiphany.  I want to make banana bread.  In my mind the banana bread was already baked and ready, and I was going to share it with my Finnish roommates (in reality, I didn't have enough ripe bananas or vanilla, and I didn't feel like going out in the rain for them).  We're often not around at the same time, so I was mentally composing a note to go with the banana bread- hmmm, how could I write it in Finnish?  I decided the easiest thing would just be to write "banana bread for everybody¨ in Finnish.  I know banana, bread, and everybody in Finnish, but I really wasn't sure how to write "for".  I decided the "lle" ending after everybody would probably do the trick, but then I wondered why I thought that.  I'm pretty sure I've never learned that in class.  Maybe I was wrong, I decided, or maybe I'd just figured it out intuitively by hearing it somewhere.  I checked to see what google translate had to say, and wonder of wonders, it agreed with me!  (of course, it's notoriously bad for Finnish-English translation, so it might be wrong.)

It wasn't until later that it struck me- I learned the construction without realizing it by reading Spot Bakes a Cake.  In it, they bake a cake for father. And guess what, father had the "lle" ending when they baked the cake for him.  And to me, that's the really cool thing about language acquisition.  Every time I muddle through a (grammatically incorrect) encounter at the bank or asking for directions, or trying to buy a phone card, I wonder- how am I even learning anything through this?  I'm just using what I already know.  But as we use what we know, we reach out and understand a bit more, and internalize a bit more, until, some day, hopefully, I'll realize I'm not just picking up words here and there, but getting the gist of things, and then later, I'll even follow full sentences.  And it's such a slow process that we don't even realize it's happening most days, it's only when we look back that we can see progress.

Celebrating progress

I've made a deal with myself that I will attempt Finnish in all public places before using English and that asking "Do you speak English?" in Finnish does not count.  (Of course, I've already broken my own rule, but I'm doing pretty well most of the time.)

Today at the bank, I was quite proud of myself.  I made a deposit and paid my rent all in Finnish! As I stood in line, waiting for a teller, I recited to myself what I thought I should say.  I was wishing for my dictionary but had to settle on my bank card giving me the needed info.  I realized that it was probably a safe bet that tili was the word for account since my account number was listed after the word tilinumero.  I must have been right, because the bank teller seemed to understand me.  I think I smiled all through the transaction, which the lady at the desk must have found odd, because in general, Finns don't smile very much, and really, what is there to smile about when filling in paperwork at the bank?  But, I was smiling because I'm communicating!  My Finnish was far from perfect (and as I replay what I said in my head, I'm amazed she even understood me- I know at the very least that I said I wanted to "buy" rent instead of "pay" rent.), but perfection is not the goal.  Communication is.  And that my friends, is being achieved, one baby step at a time!

Why Finnish is harder than Chinese. . .

So, when I started learning Finnish I had high hopes.  After all, isn't Chinese supposed to be one of the hardest languages to learn?  And hadn't I successfully told my brother not to drink juice in the living room because it was sticky and he UNDERSTOOD me?  After all, who needs more language competence than that.

So, I tackled Finnish. Bought a book, downloaded some pod casts, and immediately hit a brick wall.  Because whoever told me Chinese was harder than Finnish was obviously lying or had no idea what they were talking about.

Chinese is like legos.  You learn words, you stick them together in the right order and you form sentences. Easy.  All you have to do is memorize some vocabulary and a little bit of word order, and you're communicating.  No plurals, no verb conjugating, no messing around with gender.

Finnish is like. . . well, nothing really, that I can equate it to.  Words change all the time.  If my noun is plural and it's the object of the sentence, than its ending is different than if it's the subject of the sentence.  And if my noun is on top of something, than it needs another ending.  Or if it's headed somewhere.  And those suffixes can be added on together, and sometimes the stem of the noun they're added to is so different that it doesn't even look like the same noun. Consonants change, vowels are dropped or added.  So vesi is water, but veden is the possesive form and veteen is more or less equivalent to "into the water".  And the nouns (and adjectives) don't all thoughtfully follow the same patterns or have any distinguishing characteristics that I've discerned yet to know which pattern to use.

All of which leaves me with a lot of words floating around in my head, but not yet able to stick them together.  Even simple sentences like "my apartment has 3 bedrooms" defeat me.

So, maybe, eventually, it will all come together and I'll be speaking Finnish like a pro.  I know the pronunciation is easier, and I won't have to learn thousands of characters to be able to read a newspaper.  But for now, I'm wishing that Finnish were as easy to learn as Chinese.