It turned out that I was talking to a Korean person. A very talented multi-lingual Korean.
‘Do you speak Japanese’, I enquire.
‘Yes…’
‘Really? How much?’ I ask in Japanese
‘Quite a lot.’ comes the reply… in Japanese.
So despite neither of us being Japanese, we end up having a conversation in Japanese. How crazy is that? Maybe it was the fact that environment was noisy making it difficult to make out our non-native accents but it didn’t feel that strange. If anything, it was smoother than our previous English utterances. A novel situation making things more interesting?
I was taught one Korean phrase and forgot it almost instantly! Oh well… Anyway, it was a funky yet fun experience.
Another English person in the same group of people had an eerily similar life story to mine - just replace Japan/Japanese with China/Chinese. He inspired me with his story of learning Chinese and for the umpteenth time in my life I decided that I’d have to learn to speak Chinese, most likely Mandarin. It’s just a matter of when I get around to it…
you should! since you have mastered Japanese already haha! Maybe it’s time to start a new one…besides, Japanese & Chinese have some similarities…the kanji part haha
Ha! I wish I had already mastered Japanese. Even if I haven’t, there’s no reason not to start learning Chinese. It’s a shame the kanji aren’t identical.
Well, in fact the kanji are identical, perhaps not all the meanings though. But kanji as it is, is the complex Chinese characters used in Taiwan and Hong Kong, while in China they are using the simplified Chinese characters, which takes a lot of meaning away from the original characters, I must say.
Ganbarimasu ne!!
So the complex versions are identical? Most of the Chinese uses the simplified kanji which is (even more!) foreign to me. Why does Hong Kong use the simplified kanji? Interesting.
Oh, I thought Hong Kong uses the complex Chinese characters.
It’s a lot of sweat mastering Chinese characters, I assure you!
You don’t have to assure me - I’ve put hours into learning the kanji and yet forgotten most of them - at least, writing them.