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the fact that swedes didn't IMMEDIATELY codeswitch to english at the tiniest sight of an accent from you is a real proof that your language wasn't just "any good", it was fucking great. You should be really proud
We don’t do that.. unless you actually have trouble following the conversation it’s considered rude to change to English at least in my experience as a native swede
@@Just_Kysmost internationals would disagree. Swedes get too excited or impatient and they switch to English even if the person tries to speak Swedish
@@Just_Kys I am also native seaweed. And from my experience, the only thing that we dislike more than our own language, is our English accent. So instead of speaking English at the thinnest site of English, we speak Swedish at the thinnest side of Swedish. To be fair, I don’t know about Sweden in general but in Stockholm we have to compare our language to English constantly. Svengelska is a common joke term that describes a mix between Swedish and English. Svengelska is spoken ironically because of its connection to impotence. The impotence is directed at both the Swedish people who don’t know English very well, and the Swedish language itself for sounding stupid. A common joke in my social circle is to remake an English term into a Swedish term. But having the translation be very literal. We currently use this joke two remake brain rot terms, but also other English slang. I would like to believe that this may be a phenomenon of Stockholm. Because in a big city you’re probably going to get a job that has interacted with a lot of English culture or interacted with another company that has interacted with English culture. Either way you’re often going to interact with people from the same city as you, and that will create a little micro culture. I need to say that all of this information is from personal experience and not from statistics. Personally I only speak in English if the person I’m talking with actively is speaking English. But I would like to say that i’ve seen these patterns of converting to speaking English as fast as you hear an accent, in older generations. I would guess this is an effect off not having A lot of experience people learning Swedish as a second language.
Man I don’t know how to describe this, but I get emotional by proxy because what you just lived is what I’m hoping to do with a Spanish speaking country one day. It’s so wild that hearing you say you just had an ordinary Swedish day, to me, was the highlight of the video. Incredibly happy for you, Lamont
Coming from a Spanish speaking country, I'd say that if you ask nicely to a local to speak Spanish instead of English we'll do. I studied German for years and had to use it, actually for an emergency with only German speaking people, and they're not only extremely rude but didn't cope or try to understand me at all.
Ive noticed with spanish speaking countries they pretty much 100 percent of the time answer in spanish. Im fluent at this point, but when I was first learning and made MULTIPLE mistakes with a thick accent they would still answer me in spanish, which I really appreciated.❤❤
You have good Swedish, great job. I just want to say, your pronounciation is quite interesting for my native ears. You sound exactly like a young 18 year old Stockholms guy, with rich parents, who likes to drive cars, watch hockey and sip champagne on a boat in the skärgård - while also having the non-native sound (I really dont know how to explain this, sry). I think the best way for me to explain this is like you’re a native speaker with a really bad cold and clogged nose…? This is no ill meaning, because you really do have good swedish.
Well I actually had a cold and a very blocked nose when I recorded this, which is contributing to the "stekare" sound you're hearing. So if I sound ike a native speaker with a blocked nose... then basically I sound like a native speaker haha. There were several parts from that A-roll recording where I've stopped to blow my nose.
Jag är själv också från Australien, bosatt i Stockholm. Sjukt kult har det varit att kunna följa med på din språkresa och är så glad att du fick komma hit! Jag minns när jag var nyinflyttad och nybörjare i svenska; dina videor gav mig uppmuntran, inspiration, bra tips, ett gott skratt, och en känsla av nåt slags australiensk solidaritet. Nu pluggar jag till språklärare i svenska. Förresten, skit bra uttal pratar du med, bra jobbat. Tack och kämpa på med språktillägnandet!
På mitt närmaste Systembolag jobbar ett språkgeni från Australien som pratar fullständigt brytningsfri svenska. Jag tror att de flesta andra av hennes kunder inte ens vet om att hon är av utländskt ursprung. Dessutom jobbar där en ryss som talar lika brytningsfri svenska. För många år sedan kände jag en kille som jobbade på slaviska institutionen på Göteborgs universitet. Han kunde i princip samtliga slaviska språk. Två av dem, polska och tjeckiska, behärskade han brytningsfritt. Snacka om språkgenier. Man blir avundsjuk.
Hi Lamont. I have been waiting for this video for years since I first started following your channel. After learning French for 5 years, I spent a month in France in July and my experience was similar to yours. I reached a high enough level that people didn’t switch to English when I spoke to them. Thank you for making interesting videos and thank you for educating people on language learning. Can’t wait for part 2.
Playing snakes and ladders with your language is so true. One day I tried to communicate with my deaf coworker, and I was so mentally exhausted from events the night before that I couldn't understand him and forgot how to sign basic words like "right" to him (I've been studying ASL for 2 years now, I'd place myself B1 if I had too). I was so embarrassed and felt so, so bad. The next time I saw him (a week later) I was the translator for our staff meeting seeing as my job did not provide a professional translator and I am the only one who knows sign language throughout the entire facility. While I did not translate perfectly, and I defaulted to fingerspelling certain words I had never used before, he understood and complimented me immensely on my progress, even said I should become a professional translator. After that interaction I felt much more accomplished.
I still remember a night back when I was learning French and Swedish, and I was at some small party thing and then my friend asked me to come and get a drink with him and some other people, and the other people turned out to be some French, and some Swedish... and MAN if those languages were not just rolling off the tongue for me that night. I mean, of course it was relative to my ability... so I'd definitely speak Swedish better nowadays (by a lot), but basically that night I was just on form... not sure what it was.
en fransk youtuber har gjort en video om ett hotell i västerås, den i sjön. jag är från frankrike och det var så här jag fick höra talas om staden haha
the bit about seeing the wonder in little mundane daily things and places is so real, i think to me languages kind of inherently are able to carry a bit of that wonder within them, with time they feel almost like a souvenir that reminds you of those pieces of the world you gained access to by learning them. cant wait for pt 2 ❤
Det finns något speciellt i Kumla, ett högsäkerhetsfängelse (till på köpet det mest kända/ökända skulle jag säga), Kumla anstalten XD. Hoppas att du snart får chansen igen att hälsa på här i Sverige, kan rekommendera fjällen eller kanske inte, det är ju inte så mycket folk där man kan prata med :)
Haha, jag tänkte nämna fängelset och särskilt att den där Knutby killen (edit: Helge Fossmo) är inlåst där... men det kändes lite taskig. Faktiskt så gillade jag den korta tiden jag spenderade i Kumla. Kvinnan där som pratade med mig om tågen trodde att jag var svensk... så jag gillade henne. :-)
Min familj har mycket nära kontakt med Åsas familj. Invecklad historia som går långt tillbaka. Senast för några veckor sedan bara hjälpte hon min farsa som chaufför för han får inte köra bil idag.
Jag är väldigt förvånad över att fängelset inte nämndes, säger man att man bor i Kumla till vem som helst i hela Sverige så är det det första de säger. Vet inte hur många som skämtat och frågat mig "i Kumla eller på Kumla?" 😂 Många vet inte ens att det är en stad också och inte bara ett fängelse. Så det var nästan lite uppfriskande att höra att Kumla inte är känt för något 😅
It's so cool to have been watching your videos for so many years and to see you make it to Sweden and talk about your experience there. It's such a joy to watch. Also @3:19 LOVE the hat!!
Oh if you like the hat, you should definitely check out my video from like 2 back called "Why speaking a language to learn it is wrong" or something like that. You'll understand when you see it.
Just hit 1,500 hours in Dreaming Spanish. What you said around the 10:00 minute mark about speaking identifying what you don’t know is clutch. So very spot on.
Jättefin video. Ser fram emot del 2. Jag har väntat på just den här videon sedan efter att du lade upp videon om ditt första dygn i Sverige. Dina videos inspirerade mig att på allvar lära mig spanska genom comprehensible input (och med Dreaming Spanish). Drygt 100 dagar senare så har jag nu drygt 100 timmar comprehensible input (utöver alla timmar jag lyssnat på spanska där språket varit lite för avancerat och snabbt) och gjort stora framsteg i min hörförståelse på spanska. Välkommen, välkommen hit.
I grew up being told that we were “German” but only heard a few phrases and stories of Germany here and there. My grandmother was born in Augsburg and moved to the US and had kids and died before I was born. My family rarely talked about it really, and before I had kids, I really wanted to travel and perhaps go near where she was from. But then my dad actually gave me the addresses of some of my relatives, and I spent a year learning German - enough to make some conversation, get around places, talk about myself, etc. and I was so fortunate that I was able to spend a lot of time in Germany. I was alone for much of my time there, and once I went to a really small place just for the night and randomly stopped in a biergarten that was serving chili. No one else was there except and older couple and I struck up a conversation with them and it was COMPLETELY in German. They didn’t switch to English at all, even when I told them I was American. I told them I was visiting family soon and they said their son lived nearby and we made little jokes and it was crazy to me that I was speaking in German in Germany to native speakers. Once, I even went to a little train stop and was buying water from the store and the woman spoke to me in German and didn’t even suspect I wasn’t German, even though I had no idea what she was saying 😂 Then, I met up with my relatives and it was amazing. I got to go to the house my great-grandfather BUILT where my grandmother was born, and they said I looked like her and I felt so welcomed and it was an unforgettable experience. ❤ I reached out to them in German by sending a letter and then we exchanged emails and just from learning a bit of German I was able to have a life changing experience. Some of them spoke English, which was helpful, but it meant a lot to me that I gained back some of my culture and heritage by trying to learn and immerse myself. I love learning Swedish because it’s a very cool sounding language and it’s very similar to German, and I really hope I get to visit Sweden and have similar experiences!
I’ve learned German through comprehensible input for 3 years, and I can now understand almost everything said on the news, and I can read fairly difficult texts with no dictionary, but I have never spoken a single sentence to anyone, really need to get on italki or something😂
@@ethanhastings7816 The first few times trying to speak are really difficult and uncomfortable, but your speaking will soon catch up to the other skills with a bit of practice.
@ yeah it’s honestly crazy how I can already form grammatically complex sentences in my head without studying grammar or having any social interaction with a native speaker at all. Comprehensible input works, folks.
pretty much in the same boat, but i did have one singular conversation where i was able to keep up reasonably well. really goes to show how overrated speaking is
Wow! This is so exciting. I can’t wait for part two. When you started talking about continuing in part two, I wondered why you were mentioning part two when the video had only just started a few minutes ago, then I looked and the video was almost over. I couldn’t believe the time went that quickly. I have no attention span these days, so it’s kind of amazing that you caught my attention and held it for so long that I lost all sense of time. I really think that those people who say Nordics always switch to English are greatly overestimating their own abilities and going to areas where the only people going there are tourists. Because here in Norway, I rarely hear anyone switch to English if someone starts out speaking Norwegian to them, even if their Norwegian is pretty bad. The default language thing is very real. When you live with several languages, you develop subconscious rules about what language to use when and with whom. The thing is, you don’t know what the rules are because they are subconscious. So, you only really find out what the rules are when something happens to make them not work anymore. A long time ago, when I was still married to my ex, we used to speak English together a lot and I also spoke English on the phone with my mother, and I spoke Norwegian with everyone outside. So, my subconscious rule was English for close relationships and Norwegian for everyone else. I noticed that when I would start to develop a close friendship, sometimes a word or two of English would slip out accidentally when talking with that person. Then I went on a work trip to Crete. The rule then changed to Norwegian with the people closest to me (my colleagues) and English with others. After a week or so, when we came back, I got all confused at the airport in Norway. I started speaking Norwegian to someone working at the airport, switched to English and then when she switched to English, I switched back to Norwegian. My brain had just gotten all confused and didn’t know what the rules were anymore.
This comment is full of gold. "The thing is, you don’t know what the rules are because they are subconscious." Yes. And actually Louise (my English friend) and I first "met" in Swedish, and her husband is Swedish, so our default in Swedish... unless no one else is around and maybe we sort of never "clicked into" English on that car trip. I also had a moment in Estonia, when, despite knowing literally one word of Estonian, my subconscious decided it would be a good idea to greet someone in a shop in that word... and as soon as I did I was like "Well that was stupid now they're going to think you speak Estonian..."
@@daysandwordsThe language you meet someone in is a trap that’s hard to escape from. That’s why when people have a girlfriend/boyfriend/spouse with a different language and they try to learn their partner’s language thinking it’ll be easy because they can just practice speaking with their partner, they almost never manage it. My ex and I met in English and even though we lived in Norway and I spoke Norwegian fluently, it took years before we were able to switch to speaking Norwegian with each other. It always felt so artificial when we tried to switch, like we were doing some kind of role play or something.
Yes! (the role play thing) I used to be in a German speaking club that was like that. I think you've just explained that car trip to me... Louise and I default to Swedish, but we make a conscious decision to speak English when there's no need for Swedish, because I feel it's a bit pretentious to go on speaking Swedish when both of us so obviously speak English much better... and especially when we're working on stuff, it's like... Why not use the best language we have... BUT... it's still a conscious decision, even if a very logical one. And on that car trip, we weren't doing work obviously, and both of us had spent all day in Swedish and we were talking about Swedish things that happened in Swedish... so since we didn't bother to make the switch... it never happened. Hmm... aint consciousness strange haha.
@ That’s sort of how my ex and I finally ended up switching to Norwegian. I got a second degree here in Norway in order to more easily get a job and I just didn’t know how to talk about school and work stuff in English because I’d studied it in Norwegian and the same with his job. So, we ended up switching to Norwegian to talk about those kinds of things and that gradually led to us speaking more and more Norwegian together. Of course, there’s also a tendency to take the path of least resistance. When talking to someone, you tend to pick the language you both speak best. But sometimes you’re better at certain topics in another language and then it’s easier to switch languages back and forth according to the topic.
Really liked what you said about living an ordinary Swedish day. I'm from Texas originally, then moved to London. I knew it was going to be rainy in London, sun goes down earlier, etc. Knowing it is like that is so different from experiencing it. Guess what, it rains so much in London during the winter. But it's very rarely like a pouring rain. It just kind of constantly hazes and sprinkles and spits for like four months. And it's usually not super cold. And the sun being completely down by 4pm is kind of depressing. But it's a good time of year to go to the pub early.
I have done the speaking a language that isn't default language... I spent so many years teaching myself Japanese when I was a kid and then I moved to the country. I loved my first week... then I had a month of just avoiding as much as possible. I made a friend who spoke French. Later, though, we hung out and spoke Japanese. My roommates were all Americans. When I moved to Minnesota I still defaulted into Japanese with my kids and friends on the phone. I haven't lived in Japan for 17 years now, but I woke up from surgery speaking Japanese recently. Not my first language of French, which is the language the doctors were ready for. 😂 I do understand the emotions of realizing you are finally "there". I self studied for five years before moving and working in Japan. My family thought my goals of Japan were silly at the time, too. I am now learning Mandarin, and don't know if I ever will be goint to China... but I am enjoying the adventure again of self study.
You've officially made it. Congratulations! Your hard-earned experience gives weight to everything you say about language learning. I know you've had an impact on me, so thank you for staying the distance.
Jag är svensk och det har varit väldigt intressant att följa dig eftersom svenska inte är ett språk som folk vanligtvis lär sig (förutom invandrare i sverige). Och vad gäller "är det värt att lära sig språk X?" så tror jag att svaret alltid är personligt. Många språkentusiaster som vi är mer ute efter erfarenheten än utilitarismen i sig. Man gör det för att man vill se om det går, och man tycker det är roligt. Jag försöker lära mig lite nederländska vilket är helt meningslöst men jag tycker det är så himla roligt. Tack för dina toppenbra videor och det hade varit roligt att se dig vlogga lite mer också, se dig i andra miljöer än din studio :) tjohej
I spent the last 15 years reading Japanese novels without visiting the country or having any Japanese friends. Visiting this year was surreal, stepping into the setting of the novels, and it being the normal, regular, real world.
Det här är så coolt! I’ve been waiting for these videos since you mentioned you were going to Sweden. Got goosebumps too because I remember living a week in Colombia like I was Colombian, even speaking Spanish to my kids on FaceTime because my brain just defaulted that way. Looking forward to pt 2 and the project reveal
dang, I'm so happy for you, you did so much work and put in so much discipline and consistency and you got such a good experience out of it, I've been learning English for 7 years roughly too and Frech for 4 in a very similar way, I haven't gotten the chance to go to an English or French speaking country but I enjoyed it vicariously through this video of you going to Sweden, it does pay off!
As many people mentioned here you developed a unique accent closest thing I can describe is central east swedish but you have kind of a story telling tone mixed within I love it lol
What you said about changing to English is 100% correct, ive worked as a server and cashier at cafés(one of them even being a language café where people would learn languages together funnily enough) and the SECOND someone says anything in English i switch. Or if they're struggling i might help them but usually it turns into English anyways. So the fact that no one did that to you just shows you've done a spectacular job! Du pratar nog bättre svenska än mig!
I picked up German in about 2012 starting off with the "German in 3 Months" by Hugo and I worked my way through it. It was mostly because I had grown up with German culture since my family were descended from the German settlers in Adelaide. I studied it on and off for a decade before deciding to really commit to it and I've even got my B1 certificate and now I'm moving to Germany but I did a recon trip there this year and I felt the same way. 52 hours of travel from New Zealand to Frankfurt and I could hear German all around me once I arrived and it was so surreal that this place I'd only read about was in front of me and this language I'd been spending so much time learning is actually being used. It was indescribable how it felt.
The place where you explained the default language bit made so much sense to me because that's how I think of English. Like I basically need to turn my brain into Swedish or English mode.
I must say its very impressive that you spent 7 years learning a language that only me and some additional 10,5 million people or so are speaking. You will probably have very little practical use of your skills unless you opted to move here but regardless its damn cool that you powered through. I 100% agree with your statement that you need to be somewhat profficient to get a response back in Swedish, since basically every adult Swede today is more or less fluent in English many default to English as soon as they realize their English is better than the Swedish of the person they are talking to.
@@michaelmckelvey5122 yes it would be way harder, as an English speaker Swedish is one of the easier languages to learn, the languages both stem from the germanic language tribe.
Jag bor i Kumla, och jag är lite speciell! Har tittat på dina videos ett tag nu, hade varit kul att säga hej när du var här om jag hade vetat. Nästa gång kanske!
When I went to Japan for the first time I didn’t even attempt to speak English, my Japanese was at such a level where any normal task that would be required could be easily done with relative ease. Starting at the airport where they told me my luggage hadn’t arrived yet (my flight was booked and had to get on another plane) all the way to buying things at a shop or talking with the Japanese person I was staying with who didn’t speak any English. At the tourist spots in Tokyo, they would automatically talk to me in English but I would respond in Japanese, their face lit up and they smiled as they responded back in Japanese. It was such a fulfilling experience because it meant my years of dedicated self study paid off. It felt like I had unlocked a better level of experience because I put in the effort to learn the language to a high level before even stepping foot in the country.
I´m glad to see that an actual native speaker of english is going through the trouble of learning a foreign language, even tho he didn´t have to bravo mate, keep it up
Omg so many thoughts so forgive my scattered comment as I react while watching the video, but first of all: CONGRATS on this journey! What a ride this must've been, for real. And YES SO TRUE on your speaking early explanation. I've not been able to figure out why that method hasn't been working for me, but this is exactly it. You hit a ceiling, and you hit it fast. That's part of why I want to incorporate more reading and listening into my studies as my goals for next year. It makes such a difference. I notice when I go lengths of time where I'm only speaking, my language is MUCH weaker than had I been reading + speaking, for example. Also omg the seat story was hilarious, same with the convo with your friend where you FORGOT omg the dream xD I LOVED this video, thank you as always for being vulnerable and sharing your journey with all of us :D
You inspire me to keep plugging away at Latin American Spanish. I’ve progressed from understanding the gossip at the laundromat to having small conversations with clients at the Salvation Army food bank. I’ll get to Panama eventually.
Wow, you are my new role model. I as a swede have always wanted to learn Greek, but I have newer taken the time for it. This video gave me motivation to take on the Greek language!
Nice to see you collab with Refold. They have a great discord community and lots of free material, all focused on comprehensible input. They have ready Anki decks, long lists of podcasts, youtube channels, tv shows, books etc. I haven't done a course with them yet but it's only a matter of time :)
excellent. I relate a lot to this experience. I learned German, not Swedish but my whole adventure/experience is very similar to yours. Studied it mostly here in Australia and have kept it up for years. My first trip to Germany was surreal
Kumla is famous for something, they have one of the most renowned Prisons in Sweden. A friend of mine grew up there and he said it is really the only thing that's going on over there. Also to me, it is funny that you stayed in Hallsberg. I have been to the Pizza place near the train station probably 5 times because I had a transit there when commuting to Oslo but I never ever thought about going there. Kul att du verkade ha det bra när du var på din resa i Sverige!
Yeah, there are actually outtakes from this video in which I mention the prison and that the Knutby killer guy was there until recently... but it seemed a bit harsh if someone from either Kumla OR Knutby ended up watching. Plus my friend works near there, which is why she dropped me off at that station, so there is an outside chance that one of her friends ends up watching this. The locations in this video were somewhat meddled with in order to not give too much away - Hallsberg was actually only once, there were other nearby cities. As an Australian, any too places that are closer together than Stockholm and Göteborg are just the same place anyway.
Im Swedish and im pausing here at 5:38 to write this. My english is pretty good and the company i used to work for asked me to join a group that were going to the USA, the company wanted to expand into USA. I was confident and probably rather arrogant as well, "my english is good no one will know im from another country even" well that illusion stopped when we got into a taxi. He asked where we were going (just 2 of us, the other 3 would take another taxi) and i gave him the address and the first thing he said was "so where are you from". But my deficiency in USA english only got worse from there, because language is a lot of culture, slang, intonation and how you form a sentence too. Every morning we used to go to this diner that was close by for breakfast, and they had a lot of fun keeping track of how well we spoke english and what we had seen in that state. These guys and girls were fantastic, a lot of fun, some light bickering, and of course they asked all of us to speak swedish so they could hear it. Even if i could speak english it sort of felt a lot like i was a complete alien too like that we could just barely understand each other.
Yep, language is arguably our most human trait. Even Americans, Australians and Brits don't always understand each other, even when do understand the words each other is using.
I'll echo what others have said and say i've had a similar experience in Spanish and love every minute of it. One thing about visiting countries where the language is spoken is that it is what finally changed the way i thought about spanish, from being a language i'm learning to being a language i speak, which is how i think about it now.
Ive seen this channel on and off, and I complete agree - I'm swede and Ive grown up with English in music, tv-shows and games. At 7th grade I was barely vocal, and by gymaniset 3rd grade I became nearly fluent. Now Im 30 and can talk with proffesionally terms. I'm so amazed with people learning another language, because English is global while swedish isnt.
This is such a great video. I can only imagine how it must have felt to go to Sweden after so many years learning the language. I hope to experience the same thing in 2025 when I just might get to go to France 🤞though i second the cost and distance from Australia 😭 it’s either ridiculously long or crazy expensive… and sometimes it you’re very unlucky… both 😅
Jag har följt dig ganska länge skulle jag säga. Att folk svarar dig på svenska är typ bästa komplimangen man kan få. Eftersom jag följer dig så märker jag att svenska inte är ditt första språk, men om jag mötte dig "in the wild" och inte visste nåt om dig så är jag inte så säker på att jag skulle göra det. Fett kul att du fått payoff för ditt slit.
Håller med, jag skulle nog gissa på att han är från Stockholm om jag bara hörde det lite kort. För mig som inte är stockholmare låter det ungefär så iaf
This would have to be me for every language since at least for a couple of years I won't be able to travel anywhere. I would consider actually visiting the country as a good exam of what I actually learned versus what I think I learned. It would require imagining what I need to know first and foremost in order to not get (as) stumbled when speaking to the natives.
That happened to me in Finland on the train. I just sat anywhere, as it is in the UK, but in Finland you are given a specific seat. I was sitting where a woman had a seat booked next to her child, so moved once she told me, explained, and showed me the numbers on her and my ticket. Then I found my seat and had to sit right next to about the only other person in the carriage.
2:58 This was my exact experience in France, notorious for, apparently, 1. speaking English exclusively with tourists and 2. being really critical of foreigners who try to speak the language. Turns out if your language ability is any good people prefer to stay in their native language.
Yes! First time I went while being a french speaker, my french was ROUGH and we spent a lot of time in disneyland paris which wasn’t ideal. They often switched instantly if my accent wasn’t good enough of simple words, or I made a basic grammar mistake. But when you manage to convince people you speak it well enough, it’s a borderline exhilarating feeling to get through what is maybe a 5 min convo at most ahah I love the language, but it’s one of the most gatekept populations i’ve ever seen. On the flipside, latvians and italians have been MUCH more receptive and borderline excited to see you making progress in their language.
Awesome video man! Really interesting, and it feels like a massive goal reached for you personally. Traveling to the country that you have tried to immerse yourself into for years. Really cool to see and i cant wait for part 2 and i hope to one day do this kind of a trip to France. Ha det fint!
I can very much relate to your experience on eavesdropping. I'm a native Swede that lived in the USA for over ten years. But the first two tears or so, though I was fluent in the english language I could never pick up what was said around me while keeping a conversation myself. My brain could only process my dialogue with a specific person. everything that was said around us was just noise. it was so strange. Like being transformed into an old person with bad hearing. Tack för en mycket bra och lärorik video!
I've started doing something quite intensive for 3 days. I paste one page of The Trial by Kafka in German to ChatGPT. My prompt turns it in a bilingual interlinear text and provides the definitions of the rarest words below the text (Actually ChatGPT chooses whatever 4 words it wants, but that's ok). With a somewhat literal English translation. I read it slowly and compare the unknown words. I listen to it. I then read the Italian translation (the book is bilingual German - Italian). I know Italian well (but still don't know many words). Then I paste another page and repeat. I tried with other languages and sure will be using this method for all my reading I think. Even languages I know well. It just feels so good and it is so rewarding understanding 98-100% of a text instead of 90% for Catalan for example.
@NomadicVegan Just write something along the lines of: Provide a literal word by word interlinear translation for the following text. Provide the definitions of the hardest words below the text. If ChatGPT provides only the translation without the original, then just say something like "I want both the original and the interlinear translation". Try that and tell how it worked out for you.
I’m not one of those people that claim speaking early hurts you. But I definitely have felt like trying to hold a conversation with someone in a language before you do a lot of self study (listening and reading) is like showing up for a class or exam without studying. Showing up without studying doesn’t hurt you and in fact you’ll probably learn something, but it’s often not a pleasant experience.
11:00 This reminds me of when I switch contexts between communicating something in different languages. For example, if I was talking to someone over discord, I am usually doing that in English, but if then someone walks up to me and begins to speak Norwegian to me, I might still be trying to do stuff in English. I have also noticed, that if I am writing something in one language (e.g. English), and then get interrupted in another language (e.g. Norwegian), when I then switch back to continuing to write, I may then continue on writing in the language I was interrupted in (e.g. Norwegian). Something that might also be similar is when I talk about gaming, or something else that typically is in English, with someone else who also is a native Norwegian speaker, we might end up just switching over to English, even though we both are fluent in Norwegian. Also, how you worded it reminds me of something my dad corrected my teacher on once. They had written down "Hovedmål og nynorsk" (Context: in Norway we have "Bokmål" and "Nynorsk", it is two different written forms of Norwegian. "Hovedmål" just implies whichever is the one you use by default... your main one.), which was written implying that my "hovemål" is "Bokmål", but then could also then imply "Nynorsk og nynorsk" ("nynorsk" and "nynorsk") if "nynorsk" was your "hovedmål". What they should have said is "Hovedmål og sidemål". (Translation: the main one, and the other one)
As a swedish person i can really relate to the train story.😅 I dont know why but most swedish people dont like confrontation with strangers. Maybe we are really shy, weirdly polite or just dont want to bother. For example, on swedish bus stops in more populated areas theres often a bench under a roof. It could fit like 3 people but if one person sits on it, it does'nt matter if its on the very edge. No one will sit down beside you. I alla fall. Bra video! Mycket rolig och intressant. 👍
I relate to this video quite a bit! I went to South Korea for the first time after 2.5 years of study. My Korean was far from perfect at that point, but I had already gotten comfortable with speaking with Koreans in the US. But, I knew that it would be an absolute different level speaking to native-natives in Korea. Suffice to say, that first trip to Korea was unforgettable for many reasons. In the beginning, I felt that I forgot nearly my entire vocabulary and was deathly afraid of all the things I heard on the internet--they might have an accent, they might be using different words/slang than Korean-Americans, etc. Not to mention that I didn't have English as a backup, as I usually would have in the US. But, after slogging through it, I'm happy to say that my Korean VASTLY improved from that experience. And, even a year later when I lived in Korea for 2 months, it only gave me even more confidence just going up to someone and starting a conversation. I'm taking my friends and family around Seoul these holidays, and I'm excited to show them around this country that means a lot to me.
I was learning Swedish for a couple of years before I moved to Sweden. I was both learning it myself and at language courses, with native Swedish speaker as my teacher. I thought I did quite well, I had good grasp of grammar, strong vocabulary, but still, after I moved to Sweden for work, I felt like a 5-year old with my language. My older colleagues from Stockholm at work were very easy to understand, they spoke just like my teacher from Uppsala and used the same words as in my textbooks, but then there were my other colleagues. Skånska was quite hard for me to understad for the first couple of months, even if I worked daily with my colleague from Skåne. And the youth slang was maybe even worse... I was a young guy and my young colleagues were speaking to me like they used to speak with their friends, but often I didn't even know what the topic of the conversation was... They don't teach you a lot of slang in a Swedish textbook. :)
Hi! Didn't watch the whole video yet, but wanted to post an idea here. One thing that I really struggle with is choosing a language and STICKING to it. I would always go back and fourth between norwegian and swedish, sometimes even losing all my motivation. The reason for this, in my case, are the questions "will it be the right country to live in?" & "will i have the chance to live in that country?". I know ur situation might be different, but in my case, as a 22 years old guy from Romania, my main motivation for learning a nordic language is trying to relocate to that country and become part of that society. But what always makes me quit or switch the language is either the thought that "nah, i won't be able to relocate there" or "yeah, but there are many issues in that country, is it really what i want?" (for example the immigration problem in Sweden). I even talked to a swedish man in Romania a few days ago and he told me "Sweden is a lost cause" (related to the immigration issues). What is ur view on such things? I'd love to hear that, maybe in a comment, maybe in a video. Thanks!
Norwegian and Swedish are absurdly close. Learn one, and learn it well, and the second one will be child's play. I've been hemming and hawing between Japanese (where the interesting content is) and Korean (where I actually have work colleagues at and travel to sometimes) for years. And if I'd just dedicated myself to one for two years? Well, yeah, I don't think I need to tell you I'd actually be somewhere with them rather at the proverbial starting line overthinking the choice.
I would just learn Norwegian because it's essentially the middle of the three and that way it doesn't matter which one you end up able to go to. The immigration thing in Sweden... hmm, I'm sure some areas are a bit like that, but in the parts I was in it wasn't nearly as big a problem as it is in parts of Australia which have become like going to China without taking the plane... and even that, to me, isn't really that big of an issue. It's like when you hear that the USA is just a big civil war and everyone's divided over the right or the left and whatever and then you go there and you're like "So... is there a day off from the war or what?"
@Komatik_ @daysandwords Thanks a lot! I’ll just pick norwegian and won’t look back. I already spent so much time of my life trying to choose a language that, if i wouldve focused on one, i’d probably be an advanced speaker by now.
@@daysandwords Thanks for the info! Do you recommend using the free plan or buying the premium version? And also, is there any code/discount for your followers? Thanks!
I relate greatly to your car trip experience. When I was in Japan I got a lift by another exchange student which whom I always spoke to in Japanese when we were among friends even though we probably have both have greater English ability
Bro, I'm so curious about your follow up video Holy shit this whole video was like a giant cliffhanger! And I've never even seen you before 😂 But I can tell you this, just wait till you get comfortable enough to switch language back and forth effortlessly. As a native Swedish speaker who obviously also have somewhat of a grasp on English, the time I decided to mess with my brothers wife (who's English and doesn't really speak Swedish) by changing language mid sentence was.. Well.. To my surprise, she was super impressed by it, and I found myself 'having' to explain the process in an attempt to downplay it, to not make it seem like a great deal, but my explanation somehow painted me like something akin to a superhero, the whole thing was so surreal 😂
14:10 Also, because your skills of anything varies from day to day, so constantly expecting to be better than the last time will just lead to disappointment. Some days will be surprisingly good, others will be surprisingly bad, and it can vary from anything in between. But if you keep on practicing, all of it will slowly increase. Just don't expect every day to be surprisingly good.
Detta är mycket intressant! Du pratar bättre svenska än t ex Sveriges drottning som har levt här i åtminstone 50 år 😂 Det vore väldigt intressant höra dina tips till oss så prater engelska som andra språk, vad kan vi göra för att bättre på vår engelska? Det måste finnas massa subtila saker som är lätta att missa om man inte är född in i språket. Jag testar nu att använda Chatgpt advanced voice mode för att träna mig i att prata engelska. Chatgpt får sedan ge mig feedback på vad jag kan förbättra.
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Part 2:
th-cam.com/video/o3zOLX7m4mg/w-d-xo.html
Grabben svenska är enkält
Det tar bara 1.5 år typ att lära
As a Swedish dude. Your Swedish is amazing. And the accent is Unique. Never heard anyone with that accent. It’s like a new thing. Well done!
Håller helt med
Uppskatar det du gör
aa ja vet de e fan ass coolt
håller oxså med
the fact that swedes didn't IMMEDIATELY codeswitch to english at the tiniest sight of an accent from you is a real proof that your language wasn't just "any good", it was fucking great. You should be really proud
We don’t do that.. unless you actually have trouble following the conversation it’s considered rude to change to English at least in my experience as a native swede
@@Just_Kysmost internationals would disagree. Swedes get too excited or impatient and they switch to English even if the person tries to speak Swedish
@@CatchTheLoveBugno you’re probably speakinh reslly bad swedish then
@@thegnome9529 I'm Swedish..
@@Just_Kys I am also native seaweed. And from my experience, the only thing that we dislike more than our own language, is our English accent. So instead of speaking English at the thinnest site of English, we speak Swedish at the thinnest side of Swedish. To be fair, I don’t know about Sweden in general but in Stockholm we have to compare our language to English constantly. Svengelska is a common joke term that describes a mix between Swedish and English. Svengelska is spoken ironically because of its connection to impotence. The impotence is directed at both the Swedish people who don’t know English very well, and the Swedish language itself for sounding stupid. A common joke in my social circle is to remake an English term into a Swedish term. But having the translation be very literal. We currently use this joke two remake brain rot terms, but also other English slang. I would like to believe that this may be a phenomenon of Stockholm. Because in a big city you’re probably going to get a job that has interacted with a lot of English culture or interacted with another company that has interacted with English culture. Either way you’re often going to interact with people from the same city as you, and that will create a little micro culture. I need to say that all of this information is from personal experience and not from statistics. Personally I only speak in English if the person I’m talking with actively is speaking English. But I would like to say that i’ve seen these patterns of converting to speaking English as fast as you hear an accent, in older generations. I would guess this is an effect off not having A lot of experience people learning Swedish as a second language.
Man I don’t know how to describe this, but I get emotional by proxy because what you just lived is what I’m hoping to do with a Spanish speaking country one day. It’s so wild that hearing you say you just had an ordinary Swedish day, to me, was the highlight of the video. Incredibly happy for you, Lamont
Coming from a Spanish speaking country, I'd say that if you ask nicely to a local to speak Spanish instead of English we'll do.
I studied German for years and had to use it, actually for an emergency with only German speaking people, and they're not only extremely rude but didn't cope or try to understand me at all.
Same. I love Spsnish.
Ive noticed with spanish speaking countries they pretty much 100 percent of the time answer in spanish. Im fluent at this point, but when I was first learning and made MULTIPLE mistakes with a thick accent they would still answer me in spanish, which I really appreciated.❤❤
You have good Swedish, great job. I just want to say, your pronounciation is quite interesting for my native ears. You sound exactly like a young 18 year old Stockholms guy, with rich parents, who likes to drive cars, watch hockey and sip champagne on a boat in the skärgård - while also having the non-native sound (I really dont know how to explain this, sry). I think the best way for me to explain this is like you’re a native speaker with a really bad cold and clogged nose…? This is no ill meaning, because you really do have good swedish.
Well I actually had a cold and a very blocked nose when I recorded this, which is contributing to the "stekare" sound you're hearing. So if I sound ike a native speaker with a blocked nose... then basically I sound like a native speaker haha.
There were several parts from that A-roll recording where I've stopped to blow my nose.
@@daysandwords Stekare!? Are you sure you're not secretly one of us... O_o
@@cecilia7932 He has already approached the *Schhtekare* phase, soon he'll begin the *Vaska* phase and then we'll all be in trouble
Grisch😱😱
@sjukt att du vet om stekare, ganska feting ska inte ljuga
Jag är själv också från Australien, bosatt i Stockholm. Sjukt kult har det varit att kunna följa med på din språkresa och är så glad att du fick komma hit! Jag minns när jag var nyinflyttad och nybörjare i svenska; dina videor gav mig uppmuntran, inspiration, bra tips, ett gott skratt, och en känsla av nåt slags australiensk solidaritet. Nu pluggar jag till språklärare i svenska. Förresten, skit bra uttal pratar du med, bra jobbat. Tack och kämpa på med språktillägnandet!
På mitt närmaste Systembolag jobbar ett språkgeni från Australien som pratar fullständigt brytningsfri svenska. Jag tror att de flesta andra av hennes kunder inte ens vet om att hon är av utländskt ursprung. Dessutom jobbar där en ryss som talar lika brytningsfri svenska. För många år sedan kände jag en kille som jobbade på slaviska institutionen på Göteborgs universitet. Han kunde i princip samtliga slaviska språk. Två av dem, polska och tjeckiska, behärskade han brytningsfritt. Snacka om språkgenier. Man blir avundsjuk.
Hi Lamont. I have been waiting for this video for years since I first started following your channel. After learning French for 5 years, I spent a month in France in July and my experience was similar to yours. I reached a high enough level that people didn’t switch to English when I spoke to them. Thank you for making interesting videos and thank you for educating people on language learning. Can’t wait for part 2.
Thanks Evan!
Impressive, great work :)
Playing snakes and ladders with your language is so true. One day I tried to communicate with my deaf coworker, and I was so mentally exhausted from events the night before that I couldn't understand him and forgot how to sign basic words like "right" to him (I've been studying ASL for 2 years now, I'd place myself B1 if I had too). I was so embarrassed and felt so, so bad. The next time I saw him (a week later) I was the translator for our staff meeting seeing as my job did not provide a professional translator and I am the only one who knows sign language throughout the entire facility. While I did not translate perfectly, and I defaulted to fingerspelling certain words I had never used before, he understood and complimented me immensely on my progress, even said I should become a professional translator. After that interaction I felt much more accomplished.
I still remember a night back when I was learning French and Swedish, and I was at some small party thing and then my friend asked me to come and get a drink with him and some other people, and the other people turned out to be some French, and some Swedish... and MAN if those languages were not just rolling off the tongue for me that night.
I mean, of course it was relative to my ability... so I'd definitely speak Swedish better nowadays (by a lot), but basically that night I was just on form... not sure what it was.
Som en svensk från Västerås är jag EXTREMT glad att staden får lite uppmärksamhet och jag hoppas att du fick ett varmt välkommnande!!!😀
en fransk youtuber har gjort en video om ett hotell i västerås, den i sjön. jag är från frankrike och det var så här jag fick höra talas om staden haha
Oh wow, en till västeråsare :>
@@SquidgeM0seec W!!! Vad är chanserna???
@PotatoCouchUnOfficial eller hur?! Haha
Imagine vara från västersås
Du har väldigt mycket motivation och jag respekterar det
Det kan vara väldigt svårt att prata som någon som är från Sverige, men du gjorde ändå väldigt bra
Är du också svensk
I, a native swedish speaker, just love seeing people learn our language and take in our culture!♥️♥️♥️
Tänkte först skriva kommentaren på engelska men nu kör vi på svenska! Otroligt häftigt, väldigt imponerande!
the bit about seeing the wonder in little mundane daily things and places is so real, i think to me languages kind of inherently are able to carry a bit of that wonder within them, with time they feel almost like a souvenir that reminds you of those pieces of the world you gained access to by learning them. cant wait for pt 2 ❤
Det finns något speciellt i Kumla, ett högsäkerhetsfängelse (till på köpet det mest kända/ökända skulle jag säga), Kumla anstalten XD.
Hoppas att du snart får chansen igen att hälsa på här i Sverige, kan rekommendera fjällen eller kanske inte, det är ju inte så mycket folk där man kan prata med :)
Haha, jag tänkte nämna fängelset och särskilt att den där Knutby killen (edit: Helge Fossmo) är inlåst där... men det kändes lite taskig.
Faktiskt så gillade jag den korta tiden jag spenderade i Kumla. Kvinnan där som pratade med mig om tågen trodde att jag var svensk... så jag gillade henne. :-)
@@daysandwordsfun fact jag har många vänner uppvuxna i knutby sekten. O min kompis morsa jobbar med henne på ett stall i knutby
@@thegnome9529 Din mor jobbar med Åsa Waldau?
Min familj har mycket nära kontakt med Åsas familj. Invecklad historia som går långt tillbaka. Senast för några veckor sedan bara hjälpte hon min farsa som chaufför för han får inte köra bil idag.
Jag är väldigt förvånad över att fängelset inte nämndes, säger man att man bor i Kumla till vem som helst i hela Sverige så är det det första de säger. Vet inte hur många som skämtat och frågat mig "i Kumla eller på Kumla?" 😂 Många vet inte ens att det är en stad också och inte bara ett fängelse. Så det var nästan lite uppfriskande att höra att Kumla inte är känt för något 😅
It's so cool to have been watching your videos for so many years and to see you make it to Sweden and talk about your experience there. It's such a joy to watch. Also @3:19 LOVE the hat!!
Oh if you like the hat, you should definitely check out my video from like 2 back called "Why speaking a language to learn it is wrong" or something like that. You'll understand when you see it.
Just hit 1,500 hours in Dreaming Spanish. What you said around the 10:00 minute mark about speaking identifying what you don’t know is clutch. So very spot on.
Jättefin video. Ser fram emot del 2. Jag har väntat på just den här videon sedan efter att du lade upp videon om ditt första dygn i Sverige. Dina videos inspirerade mig att på allvar lära mig spanska genom comprehensible input (och med Dreaming Spanish). Drygt 100 dagar senare så har jag nu drygt 100 timmar comprehensible input (utöver alla timmar jag lyssnat på spanska där språket varit lite för avancerat och snabbt) och gjort stora framsteg i min hörförståelse på spanska.
Välkommen, välkommen hit.
I grew up being told that we were “German” but only heard a few phrases and stories of Germany here and there. My grandmother was born in Augsburg and moved to the US and had kids and died before I was born. My family rarely talked about it really, and before I had kids, I really wanted to travel and perhaps go near where she was from. But then my dad actually gave me the addresses of some of my relatives, and I spent a year learning German - enough to make some conversation, get around places, talk about myself, etc. and I was so fortunate that I was able to spend a lot of time in Germany.
I was alone for much of my time there, and once I went to a really small place just for the night and randomly stopped in a biergarten that was serving chili. No one else was there except and older couple and I struck up a conversation with them and it was COMPLETELY in German. They didn’t switch to English at all, even when I told them I was American. I told them I was visiting family soon and they said their son lived nearby and we made little jokes and it was crazy to me that I was speaking in German in Germany to native speakers.
Once, I even went to a little train stop and was buying water from the store and the woman spoke to me in German and didn’t even suspect I wasn’t German, even though I had no idea what she was saying 😂
Then, I met up with my relatives and it was amazing. I got to go to the house my great-grandfather BUILT where my grandmother was born, and they said I looked like her and I felt so welcomed and it was an unforgettable experience. ❤ I reached out to them in German by sending a letter and then we exchanged emails and just from learning a bit of German I was able to have a life changing experience. Some of them spoke English, which was helpful, but it meant a lot to me that I gained back some of my culture and heritage by trying to learn and immerse myself.
I love learning Swedish because it’s a very cool sounding language and it’s very similar to German, and I really hope I get to visit Sweden and have similar experiences!
I can feel the effort you've been putting into your content, keep up the good work! It's great that you got to visit Sweden.
I’ve learned German through comprehensible input for 3 years, and I can now understand almost everything said on the news, and I can read fairly difficult texts with no dictionary, but I have never spoken a single sentence to anyone, really need to get on italki or something😂
@@ethanhastings7816 The first few times trying to speak are really difficult and uncomfortable, but your speaking will soon catch up to the other skills with a bit of practice.
@ yeah it’s honestly crazy how I can already form grammatically complex sentences in my head without studying grammar or having any social interaction with a native speaker at all. Comprehensible input works, folks.
pretty much in the same boat, but i did have one singular conversation where i was able to keep up reasonably well. really goes to show how overrated speaking is
how much do u "practice"? like 1 hour a day?
@ yes, on average probably an hour of input a day or a little more.
Stort grattis! Första videon jag har sett av dig och ser fram emot att se mer 😄
I am so happy for you Lamont! I can only imagine how important and significant this trip was for you. 😊
Wow! This is so exciting. I can’t wait for part two. When you started talking about continuing in part two, I wondered why you were mentioning part two when the video had only just started a few minutes ago, then I looked and the video was almost over. I couldn’t believe the time went that quickly. I have no attention span these days, so it’s kind of amazing that you caught my attention and held it for so long that I lost all sense of time.
I really think that those people who say Nordics always switch to English are greatly overestimating their own abilities and going to areas where the only people going there are tourists. Because here in Norway, I rarely hear anyone switch to English if someone starts out speaking Norwegian to them, even if their Norwegian is pretty bad.
The default language thing is very real. When you live with several languages, you develop subconscious rules about what language to use when and with whom. The thing is, you don’t know what the rules are because they are subconscious. So, you only really find out what the rules are when something happens to make them not work anymore. A long time ago, when I was still married to my ex, we used to speak English together a lot and I also spoke English on the phone with my mother, and I spoke Norwegian with everyone outside. So, my subconscious rule was English for close relationships and Norwegian for everyone else. I noticed that when I would start to develop a close friendship, sometimes a word or two of English would slip out accidentally when talking with that person. Then I went on a work trip to Crete. The rule then changed to Norwegian with the people closest to me (my colleagues) and English with others. After a week or so, when we came back, I got all confused at the airport in Norway. I started speaking Norwegian to someone working at the airport, switched to English and then when she switched to English, I switched back to Norwegian. My brain had just gotten all confused and didn’t know what the rules were anymore.
This comment is full of gold.
"The thing is, you don’t know what the rules are because they are subconscious."
Yes. And actually Louise (my English friend) and I first "met" in Swedish, and her husband is Swedish, so our default in Swedish... unless no one else is around and maybe we sort of never "clicked into" English on that car trip.
I also had a moment in Estonia, when, despite knowing literally one word of Estonian, my subconscious decided it would be a good idea to greet someone in a shop in that word... and as soon as I did I was like "Well that was stupid now they're going to think you speak Estonian..."
@@daysandwordsThe language you meet someone in is a trap that’s hard to escape from. That’s why when people have a girlfriend/boyfriend/spouse with a different language and they try to learn their partner’s language thinking it’ll be easy because they can just practice speaking with their partner, they almost never manage it. My ex and I met in English and even though we lived in Norway and I spoke Norwegian fluently, it took years before we were able to switch to speaking Norwegian with each other. It always felt so artificial when we tried to switch, like we were doing some kind of role play or something.
Yes! (the role play thing)
I used to be in a German speaking club that was like that.
I think you've just explained that car trip to me... Louise and I default to Swedish, but we make a conscious decision to speak English when there's no need for Swedish, because I feel it's a bit pretentious to go on speaking Swedish when both of us so obviously speak English much better... and especially when we're working on stuff, it's like... Why not use the best language we have... BUT... it's still a conscious decision, even if a very logical one.
And on that car trip, we weren't doing work obviously, and both of us had spent all day in Swedish and we were talking about Swedish things that happened in Swedish... so since we didn't bother to make the switch... it never happened.
Hmm... aint consciousness strange haha.
@ That’s sort of how my ex and I finally ended up switching to Norwegian. I got a second degree here in Norway in order to more easily get a job and I just didn’t know how to talk about school and work stuff in English because I’d studied it in Norwegian and the same with his job. So, we ended up switching to Norwegian to talk about those kinds of things and that gradually led to us speaking more and more Norwegian together.
Of course, there’s also a tendency to take the path of least resistance. When talking to someone, you tend to pick the language you both speak best. But sometimes you’re better at certain topics in another language and then it’s easier to switch languages back and forth according to the topic.
Really liked what you said about living an ordinary Swedish day. I'm from Texas originally, then moved to London. I knew it was going to be rainy in London, sun goes down earlier, etc. Knowing it is like that is so different from experiencing it. Guess what, it rains so much in London during the winter. But it's very rarely like a pouring rain. It just kind of constantly hazes and sprinkles and spits for like four months. And it's usually not super cold. And the sun being completely down by 4pm is kind of depressing. But it's a good time of year to go to the pub early.
Im Norwegian and your Swedish pronounciation is really good!
I want to learn English fluently. I am an Arab and I will follow the methods you are talking about.❤
your English already sounds pretty good. good luck👍
I have done the speaking a language that isn't default language... I spent so many years teaching myself Japanese when I was a kid and then I moved to the country. I loved my first week... then I had a month of just avoiding as much as possible. I made a friend who spoke French. Later, though, we hung out and spoke Japanese. My roommates were all Americans. When I moved to Minnesota I still defaulted into Japanese with my kids and friends on the phone. I haven't lived in Japan for 17 years now, but I woke up from surgery speaking Japanese recently. Not my first language of French, which is the language the doctors were ready for. 😂
I do understand the emotions of realizing you are finally "there". I self studied for five years before moving and working in Japan. My family thought my goals of Japan were silly at the time, too. I am now learning Mandarin, and don't know if I ever will be goint to China... but I am enjoying the adventure again of self study.
What a cool video!! I have been a long time follower and have been waiting for this video. Really enjoyed your insights.
Thanks!
Part 2 here!:
th-cam.com/video/o3zOLX7m4mg/w-d-xo.html
Jag känner verkligen igen mig i känslan av ”wow! Jag har just levt en dag på ”. Kämpa på! Jag är verkligen imponerad 👍👍👍🙏🙏🙏🇸🇪🇸🇪🇸🇪
great video! as a swede, your learning experience and your view on the language was very interesting to hear!
Tackar!
You've officially made it. Congratulations! Your hard-earned experience gives weight to everything you say about language learning. I know you've had an impact on me, so thank you for staying the distance.
Jag är svensk och det har varit väldigt intressant att följa dig eftersom svenska inte är ett språk som folk vanligtvis lär sig (förutom invandrare i sverige). Och vad gäller "är det värt att lära sig språk X?" så tror jag att svaret alltid är personligt. Många språkentusiaster som vi är mer ute efter erfarenheten än utilitarismen i sig. Man gör det för att man vill se om det går, och man tycker det är roligt. Jag försöker lära mig lite nederländska vilket är helt meningslöst men jag tycker det är så himla roligt. Tack för dina toppenbra videor och det hade varit roligt att se dig vlogga lite mer också, se dig i andra miljöer än din studio :) tjohej
I spent the last 15 years reading Japanese novels without visiting the country or having any Japanese friends. Visiting this year was surreal, stepping into the setting of the novels, and it being the normal, regular, real world.
Det här är så coolt! I’ve been waiting for these videos since you mentioned you were going to Sweden. Got goosebumps too because I remember living a week in Colombia like I was Colombian, even speaking Spanish to my kids on FaceTime because my brain just defaulted that way. Looking forward to pt 2 and the project reveal
dang, I'm so happy for you, you did so much work and put in so much discipline and consistency and you got such a good experience out of it, I've been learning English for 7 years roughly too and Frech for 4 in a very similar way, I haven't gotten the chance to go to an English or French speaking country but I enjoyed it vicariously through this video of you going to Sweden, it does pay off!
Thankfully the Internet is an English-speaking country.
As many people mentioned here you developed a unique accent closest thing I can describe is central east swedish but you have kind of a story telling tone mixed within I love it lol
What you said about changing to English is 100% correct, ive worked as a server and cashier at cafés(one of them even being a language café where people would learn languages together funnily enough) and the SECOND someone says anything in English i switch. Or if they're struggling i might help them but usually it turns into English anyways. So the fact that no one did that to you just shows you've done a spectacular job! Du pratar nog bättre svenska än mig!
Amazing work man. Aside from the whole travelling to another continent, this was next level in the amount of effort!
Thanks mate!
As a norwegian, I can say that your swedish accent is one of the best I've heard!
I picked up German in about 2012 starting off with the "German in 3 Months" by Hugo and I worked my way through it. It was mostly because I had grown up with German culture since my family were descended from the German settlers in Adelaide. I studied it on and off for a decade before deciding to really commit to it and I've even got my B1 certificate and now I'm moving to Germany but I did a recon trip there this year and I felt the same way. 52 hours of travel from New Zealand to Frankfurt and I could hear German all around me once I arrived and it was so surreal that this place I'd only read about was in front of me and this language I'd been spending so much time learning is actually being used. It was indescribable how it felt.
Yay, can't wait for part two😃
Thanks for watching Anita!
The place where you explained the default language bit made so much sense to me because that's how I think of English. Like I basically need to turn my brain into Swedish or English mode.
As a Swede I have to say you did great
I must say its very impressive that you spent 7 years learning a language that only me and some additional 10,5 million people or so are speaking.
You will probably have very little practical use of your skills unless you opted to move here but regardless its damn cool that you powered through.
I 100% agree with your statement that you need to be somewhat profficient to get a response back in Swedish, since basically every adult Swede today is more or less fluent in English many default to English as soon as they realize their English is better than the Swedish of the person they are talking to.
10 million is comparitively a lot. There are people who learn Icelandic.
@@daysandwords And it is, I believe, a much harder language to learn as well!
Yep.
@@michaelmckelvey5122 yes it would be way harder, as an English speaker Swedish is one of the easier languages to learn, the languages both stem from the germanic language tribe.
Does give some help with Norwegian and Danish too, and parts of Finland.
Jag bor i Kumla, och jag är lite speciell!
Har tittat på dina videos ett tag nu, hade varit kul att säga hej när du var här om jag hade vetat. Nästa gång kanske!
Awesome video. I'm happy that you can share such a unique experience.
When I went to Japan for the first time I didn’t even attempt to speak English, my Japanese was at such a level where any normal task that would be required could be easily done with relative ease. Starting at the airport where they told me my luggage hadn’t arrived yet (my flight was booked and had to get on another plane) all the way to buying things at a shop or talking with the Japanese person I was staying with who didn’t speak any English. At the tourist spots in Tokyo, they would automatically talk to me in English but I would respond in Japanese, their face lit up and they smiled as they responded back in Japanese. It was such a fulfilling experience because it meant my years of dedicated self study paid off. It felt like I had unlocked a better level of experience because I put in the effort to learn the language to a high level before even stepping foot in the country.
I´m glad to see that an actual native speaker of english is going through the trouble of learning a foreign language, even tho he didn´t have to
bravo mate, keep it up
Omg so many thoughts so forgive my scattered comment as I react while watching the video, but first of all: CONGRATS on this journey! What a ride this must've been, for real. And YES SO TRUE on your speaking early explanation. I've not been able to figure out why that method hasn't been working for me, but this is exactly it. You hit a ceiling, and you hit it fast. That's part of why I want to incorporate more reading and listening into my studies as my goals for next year. It makes such a difference. I notice when I go lengths of time where I'm only speaking, my language is MUCH weaker than had I been reading + speaking, for example. Also omg the seat story was hilarious, same with the convo with your friend where you FORGOT omg the dream xD I LOVED this video, thank you as always for being vulnerable and sharing your journey with all of us :D
This is awesome dude. Can't wait for part 2 😊
As a Swedish teenager who is pretty much fluent in English this was a well made and interesting video
Jag lever i Västerås och blev så glad att du besökte vår stad hoppas att du tridevs bra. med vänlig hälsning Izabell lindfors 😊
Som en Västeråsare: jag beklagar💀🙏
You inspire me to keep plugging away at Latin American Spanish. I’ve progressed from understanding the gossip at the laundromat to having small conversations with clients at the Salvation Army food bank. I’ll get to Panama eventually.
Wow, you are my new role model. I as a swede have always wanted to learn Greek, but I have newer taken the time for it. This video gave me motivation to take on the Greek language!
Nice to see you collab with Refold. They have a great discord community and lots of free material, all focused on comprehensible input. They have ready Anki decks, long lists of podcasts, youtube channels, tv shows, books etc. I haven't done a course with them yet but it's only a matter of time :)
excellent. I relate a lot to this experience. I learned German, not Swedish but my whole adventure/experience is very similar to yours. Studied it mostly here in Australia and have kept it up for years. My first trip to Germany was surreal
> paholainen
> Australia
Kumla is famous for something, they have one of the most renowned Prisons in Sweden. A friend of mine grew up there and he said it is really the only thing that's going on over there. Also to me, it is funny that you stayed in Hallsberg. I have been to the Pizza place near the train station probably 5 times because I had a transit there when commuting to Oslo but I never ever thought about going there. Kul att du verkade ha det bra när du var på din resa i Sverige!
Yeah, there are actually outtakes from this video in which I mention the prison and that the Knutby killer guy was there until recently... but it seemed a bit harsh if someone from either Kumla OR Knutby ended up watching.
Plus my friend works near there, which is why she dropped me off at that station, so there is an outside chance that one of her friends ends up watching this.
The locations in this video were somewhat meddled with in order to not give too much away - Hallsberg was actually only once, there were other nearby cities. As an Australian, any too places that are closer together than Stockholm and Göteborg are just the same place anyway.
Im Swedish and im pausing here at 5:38 to write this. My english is pretty good and the company i used to work for asked me to join a group that were going to the USA, the company wanted to expand into USA. I was confident and probably rather arrogant as well, "my english is good no one will know im from another country even" well that illusion stopped when we got into a taxi.
He asked where we were going (just 2 of us, the other 3 would take another taxi) and i gave him the address and the first thing he said was "so where are you from".
But my deficiency in USA english only got worse from there, because language is a lot of culture, slang, intonation and how you form a sentence too. Every morning we used to go to this diner that was close by for breakfast, and they had a lot of fun keeping track of how well we spoke english and what we had seen in that state. These guys and girls were fantastic, a lot of fun, some light bickering, and of course they asked all of us to speak swedish so they could hear it.
Even if i could speak english it sort of felt a lot like i was a complete alien too like that we could just barely understand each other.
Yep, language is arguably our most human trait. Even Americans, Australians and Brits don't always understand each other, even when do understand the words each other is using.
I'll echo what others have said and say i've had a similar experience in Spanish and love every minute of it. One thing about visiting countries where the language is spoken is that it is what finally changed the way i thought about spanish, from being a language i'm learning to being a language i speak, which is how i think about it now.
Ive seen this channel on and off, and I complete agree - I'm swede and Ive grown up with English in music, tv-shows and games.
At 7th grade I was barely vocal, and by gymaniset 3rd grade I became nearly fluent.
Now Im 30 and can talk with proffesionally terms.
I'm so amazed with people learning another language, because English is global while swedish isnt.
Vänta nu, som en kumling vill jag berätta att Kumla har otroligt mycket vackert och en historia som du skulle älskat!
I am so proud of you man!!
Snyggt jobbat!
This is such a great video. I can only imagine how it must have felt to go to Sweden after so many years learning the language. I hope to experience the same thing in 2025 when I just might get to go to France 🤞though i second the cost and distance from Australia 😭 it’s either ridiculously long or crazy expensive… and sometimes it you’re very unlucky… both 😅
Jag har följt dig ganska länge skulle jag säga. Att folk svarar dig på svenska är typ bästa komplimangen man kan få. Eftersom jag följer dig så märker jag att svenska inte är ditt första språk, men om jag mötte dig "in the wild" och inte visste nåt om dig så är jag inte så säker på att jag skulle göra det. Fett kul att du fått payoff för ditt slit.
Håller med, jag skulle nog gissa på att han är från Stockholm om jag bara hörde det lite kort. För mig som inte är stockholmare låter det ungefär så iaf
@@Gizk4 Jag är stockholmare, jag fattar vad du menar men jag hade trott samma sak fast nån dialekt jag inte kunde placera typ
This would have to be me for every language since at least for a couple of years I won't be able to travel anywhere. I would consider actually visiting the country as a good exam of what I actually learned versus what I think I learned. It would require imagining what I need to know first and foremost in order to not get (as) stumbled when speaking to the natives.
Amazing work! This gives me so much hope ❤
That happened to me in Finland on the train. I just sat anywhere, as it is in the UK, but in Finland you are given a specific seat. I was sitting where a woman had a seat booked next to her child, so moved once she told me, explained, and showed me the numbers on her and my ticket. Then I found my seat and had to sit right next to about the only other person in the carriage.
It's not on every train in Sweden, it's just on the snabbtåg/intercity trains.
@@daysandwords Yeah, maybe the same in Finland.
Riktigt cool, fantastiskt bra gjort!
Crazy conclusion to your learning Swedish adventure
Bra jobbat mannen
As a Swedish person I gotta say your Swedish accent is really good, you could have fooled me
Thank you!
Kumla is very well known in Sweden for the largest and most famous prison in the country. It is called "Kumlaanstalten", or the Kumla Institution.
Ja, jag klippade bort några tankar kring just detta.
As a Västeråsare, i hope you really enjoyed our city!
2:58 This was my exact experience in France, notorious for, apparently, 1. speaking English exclusively with tourists and 2. being really critical of foreigners who try to speak the language. Turns out if your language ability is any good people prefer to stay in their native language.
Yes! First time I went while being a french speaker, my french was ROUGH and we spent a lot of time in disneyland paris which wasn’t ideal. They often switched instantly if my accent wasn’t good enough of simple words, or I made a basic grammar mistake.
But when you manage to convince people you speak it well enough, it’s a borderline exhilarating feeling to get through what is maybe a 5 min convo at most ahah
I love the language, but it’s one of the most gatekept populations i’ve ever seen. On the flipside, latvians and italians have been MUCH more receptive and borderline excited to see you making progress in their language.
Awesome video man! Really interesting, and it feels like a massive goal reached for you personally. Traveling to the country that you have tried to immerse yourself into for years. Really cool to see and i cant wait for part 2 and i hope to one day do this kind of a trip to France.
Ha det fint!
Bravo! Thanks for this! Tack så mycket!!!!
I can very much relate to your experience on eavesdropping. I'm a native Swede that lived in the USA for over ten years. But the first two tears or so, though I was fluent in the english language I could never pick up what was said around me while keeping a conversation myself. My brain could only process my dialogue with a specific person. everything that was said around us was just noise. it was so strange. Like being transformed into an old person with bad hearing. Tack för en mycket bra och lärorik video!
Längtar tills del två kommer ut.
SAMCI - its good to finally have a name/acronym for it
I've started doing something quite intensive for 3 days.
I paste one page of The Trial by Kafka in German to ChatGPT. My prompt turns it in a bilingual interlinear text and provides the definitions of the rarest words below the text (Actually ChatGPT chooses whatever 4 words it wants, but that's ok). With a somewhat literal English translation. I read it slowly and compare the unknown words. I listen to it. I then read the Italian translation (the book is bilingual German - Italian). I know Italian well (but still don't know many words). Then I paste another page and repeat.
I tried with other languages and sure will be using this method for all my reading I think. Even languages I know well. It just feels so good and it is so rewarding understanding 98-100% of a text instead of 90% for Catalan for example.
Oooh, I've never thought of using ChatGPT for that. Could you share the prompt please??
@NomadicVegan Just write something along the lines of:
Provide a literal word by word interlinear translation for the following text. Provide the definitions of the hardest words below the text.
If ChatGPT provides only the translation without the original, then just say something like "I want both the original and the interlinear translation".
Try that and tell how it worked out for you.
@@RogerRamos1993 Great, thanks!
What a fun journey! Thank you for bringing us, looking forward to the second part!
So entertaining and enlightening! Looking forward to part 2!
Thank you!
I’m not one of those people that claim speaking early hurts you. But I definitely have felt like trying to hold a conversation with someone in a language before you do a lot of self study (listening and reading) is like showing up for a class or exam without studying. Showing up without studying doesn’t hurt you and in fact you’ll probably learn something, but it’s often not a pleasant experience.
Don't feel bad about not having been to the northern part of Sweden or Norway - I was born in Stockholm, and I've never been to either, haha!
11:00 This reminds me of when I switch contexts between communicating something in different languages. For example, if I was talking to someone over discord, I am usually doing that in English, but if then someone walks up to me and begins to speak Norwegian to me, I might still be trying to do stuff in English. I have also noticed, that if I am writing something in one language (e.g. English), and then get interrupted in another language (e.g. Norwegian), when I then switch back to continuing to write, I may then continue on writing in the language I was interrupted in (e.g. Norwegian).
Something that might also be similar is when I talk about gaming, or something else that typically is in English, with someone else who also is a native Norwegian speaker, we might end up just switching over to English, even though we both are fluent in Norwegian.
Also, how you worded it reminds me of something my dad corrected my teacher on once. They had written down "Hovedmål og nynorsk" (Context: in Norway we have "Bokmål" and "Nynorsk", it is two different written forms of Norwegian. "Hovedmål" just implies whichever is the one you use by default... your main one.), which was written implying that my "hovemål" is "Bokmål", but then could also then imply "Nynorsk og nynorsk" ("nynorsk" and "nynorsk") if "nynorsk" was your "hovedmål". What they should have said is "Hovedmål og sidemål". (Translation: the main one, and the other one)
Great video and a great journey in language.
Thank you! 😃
As a swedish person i can really relate to the train story.😅 I dont know why but most swedish people dont like confrontation with strangers. Maybe we are really shy, weirdly polite or just dont want to bother. For example, on swedish bus stops in more populated areas theres often a bench under a roof. It could fit like 3 people but if one person sits on it, it does'nt matter if its on the very edge. No one will sit down beside you.
I alla fall. Bra video! Mycket rolig och intressant. 👍
AWESOME! välkommen till Svergie
I relate to this video quite a bit! I went to South Korea for the first time after 2.5 years of study. My Korean was far from perfect at that point, but I had already gotten comfortable with speaking with Koreans in the US. But, I knew that it would be an absolute different level speaking to native-natives in Korea.
Suffice to say, that first trip to Korea was unforgettable for many reasons. In the beginning, I felt that I forgot nearly my entire vocabulary and was deathly afraid of all the things I heard on the internet--they might have an accent, they might be using different words/slang than Korean-Americans, etc. Not to mention that I didn't have English as a backup, as I usually would have in the US.
But, after slogging through it, I'm happy to say that my Korean VASTLY improved from that experience. And, even a year later when I lived in Korea for 2 months, it only gave me even more confidence just going up to someone and starting a conversation.
I'm taking my friends and family around Seoul these holidays, and I'm excited to show them around this country that means a lot to me.
You're my favorite language TH-camr
Thanks for saying that!
I was learning Swedish for a couple of years before I moved to Sweden. I was both learning it myself and at language courses, with native Swedish speaker as my teacher. I thought I did quite well, I had good grasp of grammar, strong vocabulary, but still, after I moved to Sweden for work, I felt like a 5-year old with my language. My older colleagues from Stockholm at work were very easy to understand, they spoke just like my teacher from Uppsala and used the same words as in my textbooks, but then there were my other colleagues. Skånska was quite hard for me to understad for the first couple of months, even if I worked daily with my colleague from Skåne. And the youth slang was maybe even worse... I was a young guy and my young colleagues were speaking to me like they used to speak with their friends, but often I didn't even know what the topic of the conversation was... They don't teach you a lot of slang in a Swedish textbook. :)
Hi! Didn't watch the whole video yet, but wanted to post an idea here. One thing that I really struggle with is choosing a language and STICKING to it. I would always go back and fourth between norwegian and swedish, sometimes even losing all my motivation. The reason for this, in my case, are the questions "will it be the right country to live in?" & "will i have the chance to live in that country?". I know ur situation might be different, but in my case, as a 22 years old guy from Romania, my main motivation for learning a nordic language is trying to relocate to that country and become part of that society. But what always makes me quit or switch the language is either the thought that "nah, i won't be able to relocate there" or "yeah, but there are many issues in that country, is it really what i want?" (for example the immigration problem in Sweden). I even talked to a swedish man in Romania a few days ago and he told me "Sweden is a lost cause" (related to the immigration issues). What is ur view on such things? I'd love to hear that, maybe in a comment, maybe in a video. Thanks!
Norwegian and Swedish are absurdly close. Learn one, and learn it well, and the second one will be child's play.
I've been hemming and hawing between Japanese (where the interesting content is) and Korean (where I actually have work colleagues at and travel to sometimes) for years. And if I'd just dedicated myself to one for two years? Well, yeah, I don't think I need to tell you I'd actually be somewhere with them rather at the proverbial starting line overthinking the choice.
I would just learn Norwegian because it's essentially the middle of the three and that way it doesn't matter which one you end up able to go to.
The immigration thing in Sweden... hmm, I'm sure some areas are a bit like that, but in the parts I was in it wasn't nearly as big a problem as it is in parts of Australia which have become like going to China without taking the plane... and even that, to me, isn't really that big of an issue. It's like when you hear that the USA is just a big civil war and everyone's divided over the right or the left and whatever and then you go there and you're like "So... is there a day off from the war or what?"
@Komatik_ @daysandwords Thanks a lot! I’ll just pick norwegian and won’t look back. I already spent so much time of my life trying to choose a language that, if i wouldve focused on one, i’d probably be an advanced speaker by now.
P.S. Speakly, which IMO is the best language app, now has Norwegian (they got it like a week ago so the timing is perfect).
@@daysandwords Thanks for the info! Do you recommend using the free plan or buying the premium version? And also, is there any code/discount for your followers? Thanks!
I relate greatly to your car trip experience. When I was in Japan I got a lift by another exchange student which whom I always spoke to in Japanese when we were among friends even though we probably have both have greater English ability
kul att du var i västerås också 🤩
Så jävla gött änna😊
Bro, I'm so curious about your follow up video Holy shit this whole video was like a giant cliffhanger! And I've never even seen you before 😂
But I can tell you this, just wait till you get comfortable enough to switch language back and forth effortlessly. As a native Swedish speaker who obviously also have somewhat of a grasp on English, the time I decided to mess with my brothers wife (who's English and doesn't really speak Swedish) by changing language mid sentence was.. Well.. To my surprise, she was super impressed by it, and I found myself 'having' to explain the process in an attempt to downplay it, to not make it seem like a great deal, but my explanation somehow painted me like something akin to a superhero, the whole thing was so surreal 😂
riktigt bra video
14:10 Also, because your skills of anything varies from day to day, so constantly expecting to be better than the last time will just lead to disappointment. Some days will be surprisingly good, others will be surprisingly bad, and it can vary from anything in between. But if you keep on practicing, all of it will slowly increase. Just don't expect every day to be surprisingly good.
Detta är mycket intressant! Du pratar bättre svenska än t ex Sveriges drottning som har levt här i åtminstone 50 år 😂
Det vore väldigt intressant höra dina tips till oss så prater engelska som andra språk, vad kan vi göra för att bättre på vår engelska? Det måste finnas massa subtila saker som är lätta att missa om man inte är född in i språket.
Jag testar nu att använda Chatgpt advanced voice mode för att träna mig i att prata engelska. Chatgpt får sedan ge mig feedback på vad jag kan förbättra.