I think it’s sad that most Brits don’t speak a second language (only 20%!), as opposed to many of our European neighbours who speak their mother tongue and English at the very least. I took my final French exams at the age of 14, got a C, and didn’t think about learning a language again until my late teens. I can just about say ‘je suis allé à la bibliothèque’, but everything else dribbled out of my brain almost as soon as I finished my exams. For a while I just assumed I didn’t have a ‘language brain’, I didn’t consider that the UK schooling system is just not set up to encourage Brits to learn a second language!
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對我來説，大多數英國人不會說第二語言是一件很可惜的事（只有五分之一會！），相反我們的許多歐洲鄰居都至少會說自己的母語和英文。我十四歲考完最後的法語考試，成績是C，之後我到十幾歲末期都沒有再想一想學習語言這件事。我還會說‘je suis allé à la bibliothèque’，可是寫完考試侯其他一切都從我的腦袋理快漏掉了。一段時間，我只以爲自己沒有‘語言腦’，從來沒考慮英國的學校制度不利於鼓勵英國人學習第二語言！
Attempt 1: Japanese ✦ 第一次嘗試：日文
When I got a bit older, I decided to try again with a different language, having always dreamt of secretly being able to speak a second language and using it at just the right moment to save the day. The first language I tried was Japanese, when I was around 18. I went to weekly classes at Hitchin Language Centre and actually stuck at it for around two years, but I ended up getting bored as I wasn’t really into Japanese music or media. Again, almost immediately after finishing classes all of my Japanese knowledge completely evaporated. Turns out weekly one-hour classes don’t help very much if you do zero self-study outside of them and make no effort to interact with the culture…
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長大一點之後，我決定再試一次另一種語言。一輩子都一直夢想自己能暗暗說第二語言，在最關鍵的時間突然説，拯救世界。我第一嘗試學習的語言是日文，大概十八歲時。我每個星期去一次Hitchin語言中心上課，持續了大概兩年。最後我感覺有點無聊，因爲我其實沒那麽喜歡日本的音樂或媒體。結果跟上次一樣，一停課後我的日文知識幾乎馬上都蒸發了。原來，如果下課後完全沒有自學時間，也不努力跟那個文化連接，那每個星期一個小時的課幫助其實不大。。。
Attempt 2: Korean ✦ 第二次嘗試：韓語
In the early days of BTS and the Western Kpop craze, I decided to try self-studying Korean. I bought some textbooks and went to the local library in my hour–long lunch breaks from my retail job and studied every day. I progressed a lot faster than with my previous Japanese classes, especially at the beginning as the Korean writing system is so easy to learn and I was actually interested in Korean music and talk-shows. But honestly, I found the grammar way too difficult to get to grips with, and after my boss changed my working hours and reduced my lunch break to just 30 minutes, I ended up throwing in the towel about 6 months in to my language learning journey.
(When translating the first draft of this paragraph, I wrote ‘漢語’ hànyǔ meaning ‘Chinese’ instead of ‘韓語’ hányǔ meaning ‘Korean’ the entire time. I still have a lot to learn…）
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在BTS剛剛出現，K-pop在西方開始熱潮早期，我決定自學韓語。我買了一些課本，每天在零售工作一個小時的午休時都去當地的圖書館學習。跟我以前的日文課的經驗比一比，我的進步真的更快。尤其是在一開始，因爲韓語的書寫系統很容易學，而且我那時也對韓國的音樂和綜藝節目有興趣。可是，老實説，我覺得韓語的語法真的太難掌握。我的老闆也改變了我的工作時間，把我的午休縮短到半個小時，所以我的韓語學習旅程進行了六個月後，我就放棄了。
（我翻譯這段話的初稿時，一直把 ‘韓語’ 寫成 ‘漢語’。看來我還有很多東西該學習。。。）
Attempt 3: Russian ✦ 第三次嘗試：俄語
I went back to the Language Centre in Hitchin to have a try at Russian classes. Who doesn’t have daydreams of randomly breaking into fluent Russian one day and shocking everyone around you, leaving them to wonder if you’re a spy? No? Just me? Well, I didn’t get very far, because I went to only two lessons before giving up completely because the teacher was so awful. What kind of teacher just reads word-for-word from the textbook? I couldn’t believe it, so I never went back and 8 years later ended up selling Russian textbooks on Vinted. I suppose it’s good, because aside from the odd Russian rap song on my Spotify, there’s not much Russian culture or media I’m particularly interested in.
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我又回到Hitchin的語言中心，嘗試上俄語課。誰沒有過這種白日夢，突然開始說流利的俄語，把身邊的人都嚇一跳，讓他們懷疑你是不是間諜？沒有嗎？只有我媽？不過，我其實沒走多遠，因爲那個老師超級糟糕。我只上了兩堂課，就放棄了。怎麽會有老師看課本一個字一個字地念？我不敢相信，所以沒再去，八年後最後把那些俄語課本在Vinted上賣掉了。可能是好的，因爲除了Spotify清單上偶爾出現的隨機俄國饒舌歌以外，我對俄國文化或媒體沒特別的興趣。
Attempt 4: Chinese ✦ 第四次嘗試：中文
I have no idea how I had the willpower to try yet another language after so many failures (not to mention the periods on Duolingo trying to learn French, Spanish, and High Valyrian, in addition to joining a Facebook group titled ‘Faroese Language Learning Enthusiasts’, which I am still a member of…) But, I signed up to yet another semester at the Language Centre, lord knows what they must have thought of me, this time in Beginners 1 Mandarin on a Friday night. I was the youngest of the class, consisting only of a retired couple, a violinist, and myself. My lovely teacher Sandy was from China and made the classes so much fun that I was hooked immediately.
It came a lot more naturally to me than the other languages I’d tried. I’m quite good at mimicking noises and accents, which meant I didn’t struggle with the tones as much as some other learners do. The grammar is also surprisingly similar to English, so the main learning curve for me was just the writing system, which was so beautiful that I didn’t mind the hours (and hours… and hours…) of writing practice.
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我真的不知道，這麽多次失敗以後，我到底怎麽還願意再一次嘗試學習另一種語言。（更何況我在Duolingo上試過學習的法語，西班牙語，甚至高等瓦雷利亞語，還加入了一個叫 ‘法羅群島語學習愛好者’ 的臉書社團，而且我還是成員。。。）不過，我又一次報名語言中心的新學期，天知道他們怎麽看我。這一次是星期五晚上的中文初級一班。我是班上最年輕的人，全班只有一對退休夫妻，一位小提琴家，和我自己。我親愛的老師叫Sandy來自中國，她讓我覺得中文課太好玩了，所以我立刻愛上了中文。
對我來説，中文比我嘗試過的其他語言自然得多。我蠻擅長模仿聲音和口音，因此在中文聲調的方面沒有像其他學著覺得那麽難掌握。奇怪的是，中文的語法和英文的蠻相似，所以對我來説最大的學習曲線只是書寫系統。不過漢字真的很漂亮，所以我沒介意花好幾個小時（好幾個小時。。。又好幾個小時。。。）練習寫字。
Moving to China ✦ 搬到中國
I’ve always been quite an independent person, more than happy to go to the cinema, a hike or a restaurant by myself. However, I think moving to China at the age of 21 by myself may have been a bit of a stretch as someone who had only done one solo-trip before. The decision was fuelled by delusional ‘what could go wrong?’ energy and an intense feeling of hopelessness and suffocation in the UK. I was working on the customer service desk at Primark, one of the cheapest and busiest clothing stores in the UK, so you can imagine the kind of people I was dealing with every day.
I’d been to China earlier that year on a 3-day stopover to Korea and liked it well enough. So, I did a little research, found a company that would organise my TEFL qualification and place me in a Chinese school, sent them all my life savings, gave my parents one month of notice, and shipped myself off.
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我從小就是一個很獨立的人，很願意一個人去看電影，爬山或在餐廳吃飯。不過，考慮到我以前只獨自旅行過一次，二十一歲一個人搬到中國可能算是有點魯莽。這個決定的原因來自一種天真 ‘能出現什麽差錯？’ 的心態，再加上在英國時強烈的絕望感和窒息感。那時我在Primark的客服櫃檯工作。那家衣服連鎖店是英國最便宜和最忙碌的之一，所以你可以想象我每天面對什麽樣的人。
那年年初，我去韓國途中，在中國停留了三天，覺得還不錯。於是，我做了一點研究，找到了一家可以幫我安排TEFL證照和替我找到中國學校的公司，把我所有的錢匯給他們，提前一個月通知父母，然後把自己送到中國。
My intention was to teach English, maybe 3 or 4 hours a day, with ample time to travel and learn Chinese in a stress-free and immersive environment. I applied to go to Inner Mongolia in the far North, as I wasn’t too keen on hot weather and thought it would be a fun adventure. When I arrived I was informed that I couldn’t go to my desired location, and instead was sent far, far down South to the border of China and Macau in a tiny town called Sanxiang. Not only that, but I was to be their new Biology, Physics, Maths and English teacher, and my schedule would consist of 10 to 16-hour working days, on a monthly salary of just £200. Yup, you read that right. My dreams of travelling and learning Chinese were out the window…
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我最初的計劃是教英文，每天大概三到四個小時，有充足的時間探索，並在沉浸式的，沒有壓力的環境中學習中文。我申請前往中國最北部的內蒙古，因爲我不太喜歡熱的天氣，也覺得應該會是有趣的冒險。抵達後我才發現，不能前往原本申請的地方，而是要去中國的南方，在澳門附近的一個小鎮叫三鄉鎮。不僅如此，我也成了他們的新生物，物理，數學和英文老師。我的工作時間每天會是從十到十六個小時，更糟糕的是我每個月的薪水只有200英鎊。你沒看錯，是真的。我原本關於旅行和學習中文的夢想都破滅了。。。
This post is getting a little long, and I’m actually in the process of moving to Bristol right now and am super busy trying to juggle work, packing and dealing with estate agents, so unfortunately you’ll have to wait to hear all the fun and ridiculous stories of my time in China! A massive thank you to everyone who read my post last week, posting my blog was one of the scariest things of my life, in a way it was even scarier than moving to China, so thank you guys for being nice. This is of course a work in progress, but I hope you’ll stick around 🙂
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這篇文章已經有點長了，還有我現在在搬到布里斯托的過程中，一邊工作，一邊打包，也要跟房仲打交道。很可惜你們得等一下聼我在中國好玩和可笑的故事。非常感謝你們上個星期看我的文章。老實説，發佈我的博客竟然是我的人生中做過最可怕的事情之一，某種程度上比搬到中國更可怕。所以謝謝你們的支持。這當然是正在進行中的博客，可是我希望你會繼續留下來 🙂
Fascinating the journey of your multilinguality 👅👅👅
Was it you on the bungee juming picture??
Hi Risa! Thank you so much, and yes it’s me! 😀
So excited for part 2 with more stories from your time in China!!!!
Thank you Iman you absolute angel !!
Oh my goodness talk about resilience! So inspiring !!!! And £200 a month omg?? Can we hear more?? Also take it easy and good luck on ur move, there’s so much I wanna know about but I’ll save u from overwhelm !
It was pretty sad, that’s for sure hahaha. I’ll defo be posting more stories, thank you so much for all your endless support you lovely woman !!!