Which Languages? Qué idomas?

WHICH LANGUAGES?

This idea of 5 languages in 5 years began with one of my new year's resolutions for 2013: To learn Spanish. I had been studying Arabic a year earlier, hopeful that we would get a job somewhere in the Middle East. The job ended up being in the Southwestern US, which made Spanish an obvious language choice.

But that little dip into Arabic had been exciting, and after making a resolution to become fluent in Spanish this year, I thought "And next year, Arabic!" From there it was a short jump to "wouldn't it be neat if in 5 years we could learn 5 languages, and be fluent in the 6 languages of the United Nations?"
English,
Spanish,
Arabic,
French,
Russian, and
Chinese?

Or perhaps we could learn the five most spoken languages besides our own:
Mandarin Chinese,
Spanish,
Hindi,
Arabic, and
Portuguese?

Or what if we learned five languages from the five largest languages families? I like this idea best of all.

From Indo-European (includes English, Hindi, and most european languages) we pick Spanish. There are a host of beautiful languages in this group, but Spanish is certainly the most useful for where we live. I hear someone speaking it almost every time I go shopping.
From Sino-Tibetan we would pick Chinese. The fact that this language uses intonation to distinguish syllables rather than nuance of meaning is so intruiging. The fact that it is spoken by nearly a billion people is also a big factor in it's favor.
From the Altaic family of languages (Japanese, Korean, Turkish, Mongolian) we'd pick Turkish, because we have good friends in Turkey who are like adopted family members. It would be so neat to be able to speak to them in Turkish.
From the Afroasiatic family of languages we'd pick Arabic. I have an on-going interest in Islam and I think understanding a language in this family (Hebrew and Aramaic (the language Jesus spoke) are included here) could provide some interesting religious insight.
From the Nigo Congo family of languages I'd pick Zulu, or perhaps Xhosa- because those click consonants are the neatest thing.
And (why stop at 5?) if possible it would be great to add in the Austronesian family as well, perhaps Malay or Tagalog.

Full of the excitement of a new dream, I wondered if we could obtain sponsors for such an adventure?

"Hey darling, since you teach school and have the summer's off, in theory we could travel to a new country each summer and learn the language. What if I wrote books about it and the publisher paid our travel expenses?"

He gave me a "sure honey" smile and I spent a week researching the possibility.

Can you picture the feeling of an expectant mother, who comes up with the perfect completely unique name for her baby, and then discovers that the name she invented is the number one name on the list of birth registers? She feels let down, and wonders if she should use that name for her baby. Did she like the name for it's uniqueness or for the sake of the name itself? How is it that everyone seems to be unique together?

Yep. My looking around online was kind of like that.

Scores of "watch me learn-13-languages-in-2-years," "be-fluent-in-a-new-language-every-3-months," "live-out-of-my-suitcase-in-20-countries" adventure like blogs are peppering the internet. I found several travel blogs that have supported their ventures by sponsors, and plenty of ideas for how an adventure could be funded, or rather how I could spend hours trying to get funding, and likely end up with nothing. External funding given with the strings of "you much promote our products x amount" doesn't appeal to me at all.

So here we have major obstacle number one:

There is no possible way to pay for my crazy 'learn 5 languages in 5 years" dream, at least not with the "travel-to-another-country" immersion aspect of it that I would hope to experience.

Which wouldn't deter me if it weren't for major obstacle number two:

My other half (my husband) thinks this is an awful idea. "Sounds like a lot of work" and "I have other things I want to do with my summer" and "It would be stressful, painful, and probably fruitless" were some of his reactions once he realized that this wasn't a hypothetical "what if" conversation that would be forgotten the following day.

And at this moment I can see the difference between at dream and a nifty idea.

A dream persists, despite logistical impracticalities and impossible obstacles. It keeps calling, and urges us to search for a way forward. A one in a million chance is still a chance.

Happily, my sweetheart is fully supportive of operation "learn Spanish in 2013." I entertain the hope that after our three weeks in Panama he'll say "You know, Arabic next year would be awesome. I think I'll email some Universities and see if they will pay for our airfare and arrange a host family if I agree to teach summer classes for free."

What's the chance that would happen?

I'd guess one in a million.

And ahora, probo decir un poco de este en español. (Perdón por favor por los equivocas):

QUÉ IDOMAS?

Este idea de cinco idiomas en cinco años comienzo con un resolución (Como me encanta las cognados!) por el ano nuevo: aprender español. Estudié el árabe el año pasado, cuando espero que vivimos en el Medio Oriente. La trabajo por mi esposo era en Nevada, entonces español es un idioma bueno por aprender.

Pero, cuando estudié el árabe, me gusta mucho. Después de hago una resolución de aprender español este año, penso "Porque no aprendo árabe el próximo año? Y porque no aprendemos cinco idiomas en cincos años, y quizás podemos hablar los seis idioma del Naciones Unidos:
inglés,
español,
árabe,
francés,
ruso,
y chino?

O quizás podemos aprender las idiomas mas grande que no son inglés:
chino,
español,
hindi,
y portugués?

O quizás aprendemos cinco idiomas que vienen de las familias de idioma mas grande? Me gusta este idea mucho.

De "indo-europo" yo quiero español.
De "sino-tibetano" yo quiero chino.
De la familia de idioma llama "altaico" yo quiero turco.
De "afroasiático" yo quiero árabe.
De "Nigo Congo" yo quiero zulú o xhosa-- porque esos sonidos "clic" "clic" son muy bueno.
Y por qué terminar a cinco idiomas? Después esos quizas Malay o Tagalog tambien.

Estoy emocionado por este sueño, y penso "quizás un otro persona me dar dinero?" (Eso es un penso tonto, yo sé.)

Me digo a mi esposo: "Quiero, porque tu enseñas escuela y no debas trabajar en el verano, quizás podemos ir a nuevo país cada verano y aprender el idioma? Tal vez escribo libros de eso, y la gente que hacer los libros nos pagar?"

El dice "lo que quieras" y voy a traer información de esto posibilidad.

Tal vez puedes imaginar un madre con un nombre perfecto y único por su hijo, y entonces ella descubre esté nombre es más popular.

Si, cuando busco en el internet es como esto. Mi sueño de aprender idiomas no es único.

Hay muchas "blogs" creen de las personas que voy a país differente. Unos de esos personas ganar dinero por eso.

Entonces, aqui es la dificultad number uno:

No puedo pagar por mi "aprendemos cinco idiomas en cincos años" sueno, al menos, no puedo pagar por ir a un otro país cada año.

Eso no esta una problema grande si no hay una otro problema.

Mi esposo penso que mi sueño es terrible. El dice: "Eso idea es mucho trabajo" y "Tengo otro cosas que hacer en el verano" y "Tratamos a aprender otro idioma en una año? Es horrible, terrible, impossible!"

Y ahora, me veo la diferencia entre un sueño y un idea. Un sueño es mas fuerte. Un sueño existe en mi corazon aunque todo el mundo dice "no puedes hacer." Un posibilidad de uno en un millón es pequeño pero es verdad un posibilidad.

Gracias, mi esposo deseo aprender español este año. Espero que después aprendemos español él quiero aprender árabe. Tal vez él puede decir: "El verano proximo vamos a la medio oriente."

El oportunidad de eso? Probablemente un en un millón.

**I did look up just a few words (como las palabras por diferente idomas) in a dictionary when writing this post**