Learning Finnish - Week 1

Learn Finnish they said.

It will be fun they said.

Just kidding, no-one ever said that learning Finnish is fun. I think someone even said that it's impossible to learn.

Well, I usually tackle the things that are impossible, just to laugh in the end. ("No girls on the tourbus" And I laughed...)

So I've had my first week of Uni with my Finnish course and what can I say? It's pretty overwhelming to learn a new language. Especially if your book is in Finnish only. Literally, there is no word in german or english inside. Don't ask me why.

I once learned italian. To say I speak italian is a pretty big exaggeration. And I actually like languages, but back in school, italian killed it for me. We didn't learn any words, we didn't even have a normal book (we were one of the first school to teach italian, so there were no books for us yet), but a "Learn italian in 4 Weeks!"-Book for tourists. That's basically what we learned: To ask where the next hotel is, when the train is leaving and that we want to eat a pizza. 

I learned English in the same school. I like to think that my English is pretty good and I feel comfortable blogging in that language. I would NEVER EVER write an article in italian. Never.

So the first association when I sat in the course and looked at the book, I was reminded of learning italian and how much that sucked and that I'm actually a little ashamed that my latin is better than my italian. 

I was kind of overwhelmed and pledged that I would go learn my words every day.

On the second day of the course (the course is on Tuesdays and Wednesdays for 2hrs) we had to make an introduction of some character (say some basics like name, gender, age and job) and I struggled through mine, not being able to build on sentence, whereas the others had no problems. I know the numbers and know the system behind it (Fuck you, French, look at Finnish, THAT's how you're supposed to count, you cunt!), but it takes some time to translate the number in my head, whereas the others seemed to be able to count like it was their mother tongue. Gah.

But that's not a reason to give up...if I had given up everytime something seemed hard or I didn't get it at first glimpse (I once walked past the tourbus while searching for the tourbus.), I never would giggled myself to sleep about how easy everything was. 

I have to do the work and drop the struggle. Just try and if it doesn't work, try again, for Fuck's sake! That's how you do life.

And that's also how you learn a new language.

Learning Finnish

October is coming. And with it, University. I've been studying for longer than I feel comfortable sharing and I'm in desperate need of some curricula from other subjects to complete my journey at Uni Wien. 

 

I've tried to take some of the subjects that are close to my major, which is media and communica1tion science (in short, journalism), but they all bored me to death, resulting in bad results or even better, tests never taken.

So, I decided I might as well take advantage of the possibility to learn a new language while I still have the chance. I have the grand qualification in Latin, and that is something a lot of people do not have and therefor have to take latinum classes first. I don't; I can jump right into classes.

And I've wanted to learn Finnish since... I was 13 I think. And I know I was a1 little crazy back then and I know that I'm a lot crazy now. I remember getting a Finnish dictionary at the library in my home tow1n a1nd looking up words, w1riting them dow1n on flash cards to study. Of course, i never got very far. I think the most Finnish I picked up was through watching the Nightwish DVD, listening to Levan Polka on repeat and drinking with Finnish persons.

So, why do i still want to learn Finnish?

There are idiotic reasons and reasons that are actually healthy.

I haven't really had a life since over a year, obsessing over (Finnish) things and I saw a light at the end of the tunnel in April... but guess what! There was no life waiting for me there. There was a new apartment that desperately needed renovations and work weeks. 7 days straight, one day off, and so on. I went to my dance classes because I paid for them up front, but if I had the choice, I would have stayed at home, sleeping. That's basically what sums up my life the whole summer: Working, sleeping, working. And it wasn't all for nothing. In May I decided I want to go Epic Metal Fest in the Netherlands and since then more and more bands I love have announced concerts in my area. And if they didn't, I would book a train ticket. Nothing makes me feel as alive as a concert, so I will chase that feeling. And if it ruins me. But after working nonstop all summer, I can afford all these trips and I honestly can't wait!

But I know that waiting for the next concert is not enough. I need something of value to do in my everyday life. I want to write more again. I think of writing a serial novel for this blog. I've had ideas floating around and I think I turn them into something fun to read. 

The finnish classes are on three days of the week, so I'll be spending a lot of time with that as it is. A friend asked me to share my new acquired wisdom with her and I think I'll aslo keep updates here on the blog. 

It finally feels like I have something more to do with my life than just work and sleep. And I'm incredibly looking forward to it.

...

And if you ask me why, isn't this view reason enough?