how language learning is going

You may remember, one of the things I was most excited about and one of the things I was most terrified about was language acquisition. It deserved both of those.

I love the Russian language. I appreciate the way it sounds. I enjoy making up words based on patterns of word-formation I’ve observed… and then having them be real and correct words. I’m even starting to like the weird varieties of syntax and intonation.

But all of that said, the Russian language is hard. Listening takes a lot of energy, especially when you’re listening to an educated person who is going to play with syntax for stylistic/poetic purposes. Speaking takes even more energy, because syntax isn’t worth beans if you can’t put the words in the right cases and, even more importantly, put the stresses on the correct syllables.

I’ve now been in Russia for almost exactly half of my semester. We arrived 8 weeks and 2 days ago. We leave 8 weeks and 1 day from now. So how are things going with this wonderful and treacherous attempt?

Well, when I got here, it was hard for me to put sentences together. As one of my friends on the program put it, I “would say a word or two and then motion the rest of the sentence, and kind of hope that people understood.” Also, it was very hard for me to listen to Russian selectively. If I didn’t understand every word in the sentence, I got so caught up in trying to figure out the ones I didn’t know that I couldn’t have told you which words were actually important to understanding the meaning. Reading was hard for the same reason.

Now, halfway through, I have a few milestones to point to and say, “Yes, I have improved.”

1. Yesterday, I pulled off a complex unreal conditional sentence, and I realized that I wasn’t translating from English to Russian in my head.
2. Several people have told me that I speak “almost without an accent.” Granted, all three of these instances were after 2-3 fairly simple sentences, the vocabulary for which I felt comfortable enough with to speak at a normal pace with normal intonation (nothing to break the rhythm of a sentence like pausing for 10 seconds to say “um” and try to remember the next word). But still.
3. My first week at church, I understood about 20% of the sermon. This week, I’d say I was up to 85%.
4. AND I know my numbers well enough to follow along when we’re flipping to 15 different passages in the space of 3 minutes!
5. There were three whole sentences in my last essay on which my tutor made zero corrections.
6. I have yet to successfully give directions to someone, but I have successfully told several people how I really don’t know my own way around, and they should ask someone else.
7. I have complained at a restaurant, and they understood me and fixed it.
8. I can now understand about 23% of what Nastya says, as opposed to maybe 6% in the beginning. (But even Andrei and Natasha say they sometimes don’t understand her, she talks so fast.)
9. I’m pretty comfortably at a 2^nd grade reading level. I made it about 100 pages into my host sister’s book from 3^rd grade, and I need a dictionary occasionally, but not too often.
10. I have attended a девичник (girls-only social gathering), which included such things as casual conversation, Pictionary Telephone, and a role-playing/improv game. I participated in everything, and even landed the lead role in the role-play for my team… and didn’t feel half as scared as I did two months ago when just walking into a café and ordering tea.

On a more formal level: classes are going well. I’m getting good marks. I’m getting to the point where I know most of the vocabulary my teachers use on a regular basis, and I have to work harder to learn new things, which is good.

Except in Politics. If I learn anything there, it’s new. I take notes and then go home and translate them, because I don’t know any of the vocabulary. I have a midterm for that tomorrow. As I write this, I ought to be either studying or sleeping, but I’m sure I’ll be okay…?