I know some people who only speak French. And people that only speak English… I never could have done that.

Very early, I discovered I had an easiness with language learning. It probably came from my interest in other languages, or at least, that helped a lot.

I learned English out of pure need. I lived in Guinea back then, and that particular year, the only other expat my age was an American teenager. Cute and friendly, and well, you know, people aren’t too picky when it comes to friends if you don’t have much choice. I guess we were both lucky, because we became very close friends.

But at the beginning of the school year, we soon noticed that it would be a weird friendship if we didn’t do anything about communication. I spoke French and a few words of English, he spoke English and a few words of French… So I took the task of perfectioning my English to go a step further than small talk.

He gave me a book and a dictionnary. I still remember the book, Dean Koontz’ “Watchers”. He told me to read it, and it would improve my vocabulary. It was a hell of a job, but within a few months, even if he was still laughing every time I’d try to say “comfortable”, we could have long chats and dream of changing the world together…

At school, I had to try German, for two years, because in Africa, our teachers were from France, and in France, it seemed the 3rd language thaught to children was German, instead of Spanish which I would have studied if I had stayed in Canada.

German was hard, but I built a good base which wore off with time. I would have needed to practice, and I had no teenage cute German friend.

I studied sign language for a while too. Seriously, since I had in mind to become an interpreter. I still remember some of it… The basic stuff, greetings and such…

I tried Vietnamese… that was the start of my learning just for fun phase. But learning Vietnamese, for me, was like having to learn a new language AND learn to sing at the same time. There again, the lack of Vietnamese friends to practice with didn’t help. It was a while back, when the Internets weren’t as friendly as they are now…

I did learn some basic Spanish when I went to Cuba, for the fun of it… The word coming back to my memory the most being “la ultima” the last one, which I learned while playing pools… Some guys hoping to play too had come to our table. “La ultima?” wondering if it was our last game…

And here I am… About two years of self-taught Danish behind me, and still trying! I look back and I wonder, do I really have a gift with languages, or have I just been telling myself that to encourage me? I have friends actively helping me this time. I’ve spent countless hours practicing, listening, reading…

I guess I’ll see in three weeks, when I have Danish all around me. I hope to make my friends proud… And myself too.