The Lessons from Learning a New Language as an Adult

There's nothing like feeling like you know nothing to help you learn :-D. I get a lot of time to quietly reflect as well as to listen wholeheartedly as of late. While I'm trying to be diligent about studying Japanese, let's face it, I didn't grow up here, serve a two year mission as a young adult, or work at it at all during the last 8 years that I've been married to a Japanese speaker (but, in my defense, a few of those years said Japanese speaker was living and working in Korea where he spoke Korean everyday.... yah, that's the other part of my defense, I'm married to a talented linguist who hears and picks up on things that are a not even on my radar! It's intimidating, he does his best to help, but he's having to work with someone that isn't naturally good at non-romance languages and some days are better than others :-D. Things went about the same way when I tried learning Korean, and just like those years, I found that the Koreans were a lot easier to learn from. Similarly, using my caveman Japanese (a term a friend here coined), the Japanese people have been very patient and helpful in expanding my understanding. From there comes the listening part... I understand very little! The phrase that I use more often then I'd like to is わかりません　"wakarimasen" .. I don't understand :-). I'm getting better with hiragana and can type it etc., so I'm leaps and bound ahead of where I was, but still not where I want to be. The people here are AMAZING! It pains me that I can't converse with them more. So, I listen and try to pick up on context and words to help me decipher what is being spoken. This especially applies to our time at church. Most of the time I have NO CLUE what's going on, but it's good though. I listen and reflect more than ever and for that I'll be forever grateful. Again, it's hard that I can't communicate as I'd like, but just being a quiet observer has taught me a lot I've also noticed how this experience has increased my desires and abilities to teach my children language. It's tout learning a new language! That total applies to the little people in our homes... I think I took for granted the ability of children to pick up on language. There brains are definitely squishy and able to learn quickly (my 4 older kids all have honed into the Japanese sounds and diction and are mixing Japanese words with their English... which I totally encourage, it's been so fun! And we're only like 12 weeks into about 3 years of being here!) Anyway, my patience level with teaching reading and writing has increased by a million and my efforts to teach language to my little ones in both English and Japanese have been infused with more vigor than ever. Anyway, I don't know how many of you are going to drop what you're doing to move to a foreign country and immerse yourself, but I absolutely recommend learning a new language and conversing with someone that speaks it regularly. I've learned a lot about myself and my chidden over the last few weeks! It's hard to grow and stretch... it hurts!... but we're better for it in the end. Might I also extend a challenge to those whose husbands speak a foreign language? LEARN IT NOW :-D. I'm LDS and all worthy men asked to serve missions for two years when they're 19 (women can also go at 21 if they so choose). One of the things that I keep hearing over and over is how men have been reproved for not teaching their wives the language that they learned. Elderly couples are asked to serve missions as well and the message that keeps coming through is that the Lord needs couple missionaries to serve in foreign countries and that it's especially important for the wives to be able to communicate with the people there. So! If you're husband served a foreign mission maybe it's time to start learning? Definitely pray and talk to your husband about things at the very least, it may surprise you what you find :-). (And might I add, while my brain isn't as squishy/able to learn language as easily as when I was a child, I'm sure it's a lot easier to do now then it would be later in life!) We have a senior missionary couple here right now that's reminded me of this. The wife (Sister) and I work on Japanese once a week. She's studying hard and getting better everyday, but it's HARD! She remembers a prayer her husband taught her when they were first married and things like that, but the new stuff is difficult. She wishes she would have learned more then when it stuck. She also shared an experience from the MTC of her husband getting reproved for not teaching her Japanese. I keep hearing these stories! So, with the aid of much prayer and my dear husband who prays to know how to teach me, we're trying to move forward and prepare ourselves to serve the Lord wherever he may need us. For now, He needs us here and prepping our future missionaries by also helping them to learn a new language diligently (and to help their mom be better able to teach them their current language :-D). He's also teaching me to love all people and cultures, to find beauty in small things, and to quietly watch and listen. I'm grateful for these lessons. They're not easy... especially with an infant, still moving in, 2 kids in 2 different schools (where I also can't communicate with anyone effectively yet!), and a husband's who's business trips take up a lot of room on our calendar... but I'm learning! Are you learning a language or have you tried in the past? What keeps you going?

Life...

...is an always changing, daily opportunity to learn and grow and adapt (hence my blog name). Life for us has definitely followed this definition lately! At the beginning of October we were informed by the military that my husband was needed in Japan before the end of February... I was 8 months pregnant... and we had 4 children ages 6 and under. While excited, the prospect of having to acquire passports for everyone and the mere idea of having to be ready to move in January was/is a bit daunting. The last time I moved overseas I had to follow my husband by myself later with an 8 week old baby because his passport hadn't come in yet... and I'll tell yah, once I go to our layover in Seattle I was very tempted to have my in-law's pick me up and to call my husband and tell him that I would come only when he came to get me! It was terrible! Not really because of the baby, more just the people and airline etc., it was nightmarish, I was never happier to see Korean soil then when that flight was over! Anyway, thanks to that experience I had this horrible feeling that because of our time frame that I'd be moving not only with an 8 week old but also a 23 month old and 3, 5, and 6 year olds.... SO GRATEFUL THAT WON'T BE THE CASE! (Although, my husband did mention that if it was that while it would be difficult he would be willing to take one for the team and fly to Japan alone :-D).

Anyway, as the calendar screams at an alarming pace towards January I have at least one "AAHHH we're moving!" moment a day. I've grown accustomed to having to expect the unexpected thanks to the military, but this one really caught me off guard. We were given every assurance of being here clear into 2013, so we were planning for the baby, I had a race calendar all planned out for next year, we both had plans to start on our masters, we were planning our garden.... HA! They just wanted me to get cozy :-). In any case, I really do have to care for a 1 month old (as of yesterday), the rest of the kids, and make sure that our house is separated into storage, unaccompanied baggage (the smaller shipment of necessities that gets there faster), our household goods (the everything else stuff that goes on the slow boat and we get whenever it shows up), and to ensure that all the stuff we need stays separate from all that because if not IT WILL GET PACKED. So, I need to pack everyone's bags for about 2 months worth of clothes etc. Good times! Yes, "freak out moments abound here."

The one thing that I thought I had figured out was lifestyle once we got there. I got in contact with another American couple in Japan who attends a Japanese church that we wanted to go to. She was excited to hear of our coming and was encouraging of our patronizing the church. So, case closed, we're good right?! NO! *laugh* She asked me if our children would be attending Japanese school. Well, my husband and I talked about it briefly... he brought it up and I didn't turn down the idea but I certainly wasn't entertaining it either! I figured we could find some extracurricular classes to get the kids into etc. that wouldn't require them to be gone so long everyday.

Anyway, she's in the same situation that I'm in.... a husband that speaks Japanese, kids with squishy brains, and a slow go at learning the language herself (my brain LITERALLY hurts after studying Japanese). When she mentioned that her oldest children are fluent and both read and write in Kanji something in my mind clicked. I knew that our children needed to go to school there... but I still don't like the idea! *laugh* I talked to my kids about it, they're enthusiastic to go, and then I tried to talk them out of it! They'll be in school all day being immersed in Japanese, then come home to Japanese homework and they'll still be home schooled in English reading and writing. They were all still up to the challenge. THAT ONLY LEAVES ME WITH 2, COUNT THEM 2, CHILDREN FOR THE MAJORITY OF EVERYDAY! So not happy about that! I can't stand in the way of a great opportunity for them though. They'll pick up the language and culture in a way that we can't provide for them otherwise. We know we'll be there for at least 3-4 years with the potential of more, so now when their brains are squishiest and able to pick up the language is the best. My husband had offered to have them start when we go back after this assignment when they were older, but that's just not fair of me. They'll have a much easier time now. My husband's been speaking and living in Japan on and off for the last 13 years, has a degree in Asian Studies with a minor in Japanese, and is still learning new things everyday. What a gift that my children won't have to struggle to learn as much. My father-in-law speaks Japanese as well... he told me that he expects the children to come back speaking better than him too :-D.

Because of the way the schools run, my older 3 will be there to start the new school year IN APRIL. Yes, school runs from April to March. BOO! Pretty sure Heavenly Father knew that I needed to know that now instead of when we hit the ground there so that I had time to take it all in. It helps that there's a huge running group on base, all kinds of running events and triathlons between them and the nearby Naval base, and that because of the move I had to push my Master's work until April/May. Boy will I need that distraction then! No wonder my brain couldn't put aside going back to school this last year... I needed everything in place for when my children go to school and I'm with my little guys that both nap during the day. It's weird to be faced with so much quiet when you're use to chaos!

In the meantime we're all on Japanese learning track.... we have a bunch of movies by studio Ghibli (recently they came out with Ponyo which was pretty popular in the US, also Spirited Away and Howl's Moving Castle) and some other selections that the children watch in Japanese.

We also scour the Hiraganamama website like crazy! I enjoyed her website before, now it's more of a lifeline. She has links to youtube videos that have been helpful, worksheets, and overall information. I love this one, definitely something to check out! She has a New Year's card up on her site.. it's a dragon and she provides how to write a message for the New Year, we'll be working on that today! Your kid would enjoy it too I'm sure!

I also have access to Rosetta Stone and try to login to that regularly. (If you're military you should look into getting access to this for free. The library also has Mango that you can use from home). It does make my brain hurt, but I am picking up on a lot more.

My husband also found several apps in the iTunes store that he uses on the iPod of iPad to help him learn additional Kanji (which I am SO NOT ready for... I'm still trying to master Hiragana and trying not think about learning 2 more alphabets thank you very much!)

We also have a few learning books that Nathan picked up on his last stint in Japan.

Anyway! Life's been exciting here and definitely NOTHING like I thought it would be. Learning to change and be adaptable it good though :-). I know my children are headed for an amazing opportunity and one that Heavenly Father had in store for all of us. I'm resistant to change and really don't care to have someone else dictating my schedule, but perhaps there's the lesson for me in all of this! Who knows. Either way we're off for an even bigger adventure than I had imagined! It's a good thing that the one sailing this ship knows where it's headed because we'd surely be lost otherwise!

I hope your holiday's have been wonderful and that you're able to see the working of God in your life at this time to in whatever it may be that you're doing!