For the next two days I have full-day training sessions to attend which is great except, they are all in Finnish and mine is nowhere near up to scratch to be able to listen, let alone interact, at this level. It is pretty embarrassing considering I have been in Finland for over 15 years. I am there to observe the training style more that get much out of it however it is going to make for 2 very, very long days.
I wonder how many various opportunities I have missed out on because I do not have even a medium level of language ability in Finnish here. I know that one of my competitive advantages that I leverage is my ability in English but for many Finns, even though they generally speak English very well, they still prefer to speak in Finnish at the social level. this is important in a country where people tend not to be overly social already.
Not having Finnish means that I am unable to get to know some people at some levels because of their unwillingness to have the same conversations in English. There is advantage speaking in English though as due to the lack of emotive connection to the language, they can be much more open and talk about very personal things. This doesn't translate into the corporate topics as heavily though and they instead reserve their ideas and opinions.
Today, instead of trying to understand everything that is going on I think I am going to take the opportunity to observe my colleagues and our clients and see how they interact and respond to each other. It has been a while since I have had the opportunity to sit back and watch at this level so I am going to take it and see what I can learn, what I can use and what I could potentially help correct, as this is where I am comfortable.
We all have skills and of course, we all have skill gaps and part of the problem is that we tend to rely on our strengths and avoid developing our weakness. While I have avoided learning Finnish for a very long time, I am thinking that at some point when I have a little bit of breathing room and don't need to spend every waking moment doing what I must, I will pick up a class or two and see if I can improve a bit more.
After all, I have a bilingual daughter and she already speaks better Finnish than I do and she is only two years of age. What is going to happen when she is a rebelling teenager? I think I better learn something.
See you in the evening.
Taraz
[ a Steem original ]
It is good for you to learn their language since you are residing in their land. I admire your daughter's ability. She will help you in learning the language. At least you can communicate with her using it.
I am the only one who speaks English with her and it is more important she has that than me learn Finnish. I have to learn somewhere else :)
I'm sure the prolific thinker that you are will pick up some interesting ideas from these training sessions and create a few posts out of them on Steem. Some things that you see as annoying or some things that inspire you will work especially nice.
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It was hard work but also enjoyable at times and, I even joined .. not in Finnish :D
She might give you an earful on occasion, so perhaps that will drive home the proper use of expletives. I've lost count how many times my daughter has called me an idiot. :D
I am comfortable with the expletives as that is where I generally excel. ;D
I learned a second language a similar way as I was put in a school that only taught in Spanish so I had bo choice. Maybe it was that I was still young but within sid months I picked it up so this may be what you ultimately need to get last that barrier! Wish you success buddy!
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I never went to school here and have only worked in environments that use English. Socially I can get by but it isn't pretty nor sophisticated.
I have the same thing but I've no real pressing need to learn the language...your needs to understand what's being said, will be very much greater than my own, I'm pretty sure
less steemit, more speakit...?
lol
speakit would be a great app on steem. Blockchain education repositories are going to be huge.
Damn you live there already for 15 years and still don't speak Finnish? I'm impressed by the fact that you made it that long without learning the language even a little bit by hearing the other people around you... 😮 Does this fact make you feel uncomfortable or are you ok with it?
For your daughter, she knows 2 languages, but once at school what will become her main language? Think you will be missing out a lot of fun with her, I hope you'll be able to study so you get a decent base to communicate.
On the other hand, fun to watch and observe other people without understanding them! For sure the only thing you understand are the things you see so tonation, word jokes everything that colors an observation is gone for you, is this a unique oppurtunity? :)
After 15 years, I am okay with it and my Finnish is good enough that they have to be very careful what they say ;)
She will likely study in Finnish but the plan is to make her dual mother-tongue so, it will be fine in English too. I have been an ESL teacher for adults about 15 years now.
Have you ever heard Finnish? It is all the same tone. :D
Hehe you can read their lips! 😈 How was the day observing all the people?
ESL teacher... damn I still remember my first comment at one of your posts about my grammar 🤣
Yes I know how the Finnish language sounds like, I've worked for a year in all Scandinavian countries so Finland too. Some places I've worked in Finland are Lappeenranta and Espoo. Totally not comparable with the Dutch language 🤣
I think Dutch is pretty in comparison :D
Technical University stuff?
Hehe pretty you sure?😉
Technical it was indeed, redesigning networks and installing the equipment at every site from my customer but that was not a university.
There are technical universities in Espoo, Lapeenranta and where I am in Tampere. Because of this, tech companies tend to set up locations to leverage the access to quality technical students. The new company I am with has offices in all three places for this reason too.
Tampere I have been there too! But to shutdown the office...
But some companies have the same strategy here in the Netherlands, setup locations nearby the university and where not even such a big country as Finland is!
Oh man, I know exactly how you feel, I've been in your shoes all my life :) I live in Romania but my first language in Hungarian. Although I speak Romanian well, I'm never going to be perfect, I know I'm making mistakes no matter how hard I try. I've been in your shoes many times and I know how it feels. Just go easy on yourself, you at least have an excuse :) I was born here, Romanian is the official language, so I should make no mistakes.
Your daughter on the other hand is a lucky young lady. Make sure she learns English very well, it's going to be a big help for her. Good luck! :)
Taraz cannot function in Finnish. It's not a question of speaking it perfectly.
If STEEM moons and Taraz can live on it, perhaps I will run a class for his benefit here.
Can I pay in upvotes?
A delegation will be accepted, too. I need something to reward you with for correct answers. lol
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Lol when Steem moons. Maybe Taraz will hire you as his sidekick but it is true what you are saying. To understand the language you have to think in that language as well. You can't just be translating in your head every time.
That's not what I was saying, but yeah, it's clumsy to run everything through an intermediate language. How many actually do that even when they're learning a foreign language?
I remember when I was learning Afrikaans I translated everything in my head and didn't think in that language.I don't think I will be able to do that either and this is what holds me back on the language front.
Hahahahahaha running everything through an intermediate language translating everything in my head is exactly what I do here all the time.
Gosh! gotta think how to get more upvotes to gather enough steem to purchase and delegate that clumsy task to some smart AI or Bot to give a deserved rest to my messy & extravagant brain. };)
Although I don't harbor any hope that these gadgets may be smart enough as to speak my delightful spanglish also. :D
English will be one of her mother tongues.
My wife and her sisters have created there own language that they speak called double talk. My daughter isn't one yet, but I'm sure my wife will be teaching her double talk as soon as she can learn. My goal is to learn it without being taught so I can surprise my wife one day by walking up to her and being like so why where you and your sister talking about this the other day.
what does double talk sound like? In parts of Australia there is still the convict language Butcher Speak, where they talk backwards.
They have tried to explain it to me before. I think they break up every syllable and add a few words in between.
Something like hello would be said "hel to the lo". I want to say they might say it backwards as well so it might be "lo to the hel". It doesn't sound difficult until you hear them speak it and it just sounds like one giant word they can speak it so quickly.
I hope you learn and be better
I hope so too.