Sorry, there is no (new) boyfriend, but there could be a new language in the horizon.

Well, not exactly new. My first love.

I cannot believe that after close to 13 years, my interest in Spanish is rekindling. Before Korean, my first language love was Spanish. In fact, I tried to learn it when I was about 17/18 (I think) but failed miserably. The reason was that, being the inexperienced language learner I was, I went to buy a paper dictionary, a “teach yourself Spanish” kinda book and a phrasebook. hahahaha setting up myself for failure. As expected, I couldn’t quite make head or tail of the phrasebook and the textbook was not great at explaining the basics to me. The concepts of gender in Spanish also confused the hell out of me and it felt very daunting to learn the gender of each noun. Language learning felt like a mammoth task and very soon, the books were tucked away somewhere.

Back in university, I took a basic module and I’m sorry to say that the university classes did nothing to motivate me and so after the module, it was back to the shelves again for Spanish. During my undergraduate years, I was also spending a lot of time on Korean (and later Japanese) that I didn’t have bandwidth for Spanish.

And so, Spanish remains on the to-learn list.

My love and interest for Spanish actually stemmed from a rather simple reason. 😛 I fell in love with Barcelona after seeing it featured on Meteor Garden 2 (the Taiwanese version) and I really wanted to visit. I also fell in love with Chayanne’s song Yo Te Amo, which is featured in the drama OST. It was the single most-repeated song in my playlist in my teenage years (back when iTunes was still tabulating no. of plays) and till today, I still listen to it on repeat regularly.

Yeah, that is the real story of how I fell in love with Spanish. Random, frivolous, but this is how love starts 🙂

So, back to the story of how my interest is rekindling. I happened to be re-watching something in Japanese and it was only available with Spanish subs. I love reading subs, so I found myself looking at the subs despite understanding the Japanese audio hahaha. And so, the love is rekindled. I also have an enabler, who pushed me into putting that flicker of interest into action.

I found myself starting a new notebook for Spanish.

I spent some time reading a Spanish short story. hahahah I cannot believe I just did that because this was not totally not planned. Three Little Pigs in Spanish 🙂

I realised that I love to read and one thing that excites me about language is not making new friends (sorry I’m antisocial) but rather reading more books.

Also dug out my Spanish textbook which I bought in my university years. Don’t ask me where are the first books I bought. hahaha.

I cannot believe that at one point in time, I could construct sentences in the language. Needless to say, I remember nothing now. Would I get back to the same level again?

Stay tuned. hahahha

I don’t know which direction the motivation for Spanish will go, but as usual, I’m just enjoying whatever time I get to spend with languages. My brain tells me I should just focus on Korean, Japanese and Thai. Let’s see what my heart will say. ♡

13 years learning languages, 13 years writing about language learning. It’s been such a wonderful journey, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. This space has seen me in my ups and downs, provided solace, motivation and encouragement to me in different stages of my life.

This blog started out as a persona space, and I had wanted to write about my love for Korean dramas – hence the blog name! Over the years, it has evolved to a space where I write about language learning and my journey with languages. I am thankful for each and everyone of you who has stumbled upon this space, and in particular, those who have stayed with me over the years. I actually do remember most (haha don’t dare to say all) of you, and even though we may have never met, I cherish the connections we form here 🙂

13 years. 說長不長，說短不短。It feels long, and yet, when we think of language learning as a lifelong commitment, it feels like I’m still very much a young learner. Language learning has brought me so much joy, and made me fall deeper in love with books and reading. In fact, increasing the number of languages I can read in has increased the number of books I own (and e-books!) and I find myself constantly in a state of having more books than I can read. It’s a happy problem (not so much for my wallet) and I’m always grateful for the ability to enjoy more books in the world.

As I’m typing this, I’m sitting cross-legged in front of my coffee table, and there are at least 10 books on the table, a couple more on the floor and several on the sofa behind me. In this moment, I feel very blessed and happy and I just want to note it down. 🙂

Sometimes, I feel like I need to read more and read faster to “clear” the stack of books. But then I remind myself that reading is meant to be an enjoyable activity, not to be rushed, not to be forced. And so, I shall take my time.

In this anniversary post, I think it’s befitting to talk a little about each of the languages that have brought me so much joy in the past 13 years.

Korean. It’s hard to be an “advanced” learner at times. At times, I feel like I was more motivated when I was an intermediate learner. As I’m very partial to textbooks (ahahha), it was very clear to me that I had so much to work on when there are more advanced textbooks out there. Does it make sense? I know that beyond textbooks, there are so many other books / materials out there and it’s also true that I don’t understand everything perfectly now. But when you reach a somewhat comfortable level of proficiency, I feel a lower drive / motivation. I read more Korean novels these days, but other than that, I’m not doing much to improve my Korean at this point. Time to think a little bit more about how to learn as an advanced learner 🙂

Japanese. My relationship with Japanese is quite interesting. I didn’t prioritise speaking / writing, given that I was more keen to be able to enjoy Japanese media content as a “goal”. I read a lot, I listened a lot. I write at times, but I don’t speak. hahaha. In the end, I have a very skewed Japanese proficiency where reading >> listening >>>> writing >>>>>>>>>> speaking. Not proud of it, so I always tell people, please just try to improve on all four areas and not think that “I only want to be able to read”. Sure, there’s always areas to focus on, but placing too much focus on only one/two areas may bring regrets later on. On the other hand, I’m sure that if I get to spend an extended period of time in a Japanese-speaking environment, I’ll improve quite fast. But unfortunately, doesn’t feel like that will happen anytime soon. And frankly speaking, it’s rather embarrassing (personally) to hold a N2 certification and not speak like one 😛 Recently, I’ve been reading more in Japanese and truly truly loving it. I had spent a couple of years neglecting Japanese (almost) entirely, so I am very glad that the language has not deserted me. Just the other day, I was re-watching something in Japanese and this time round, I had to watch with Spanish subs. It’s amazing that I can now understand everything with ease, and even have bandwidth to read the Spanish subs and try to learn some vocabulary here and there 🙂

Thai. I’m so glad that Thai came into my life last year, and I’m just taking it slow. I don’t know where this journey will bring me, but I am just happy to cruise along and enjoy the sights.

For those who are still reading this, please leave me a comment and say hi! I always lament that blog readers are somewhat a dying breed, and blog commenters even more so 🙂

The weather in Singapore has been really hot these days and I’m lethargic 90% of the time. I’m finding it pretty difficult to sit down in front of the desk to study or read, so most of the time, I’m lying on the couch and binge-watching dramas. In an attempt to be in an immersion mode, I’ve been watching Korean, Japanese and Thai stuff.

この音とまれ! / Kono Oto Tomare!

Finished both seasons 1 and 2 (26 episodes in total) in a couple of days and I love it! The underlying themes are familiar – a group of misfits coming together and finding passion in something, rise of the underdog, friendships and growth, family problems etc. I love this kind of slice-of-life/coming-of-age stories and I think that the story is executed well in this series. Not particularly exciting, but I love the warmth of the story and how the characters learn to be dependent on one another. Trust seems to be an often-explored theme in the story and the characters learn to rely on others instead of trying to keep it all in. Trust is still a very difficult issue for me and I wonder if that’s because I’m too twisted (lol) and don’t give others / myself a chance, or people are just still… not worthy of trust LOL.

In any case, this was an enjoyable watch and I would have gotten its light novels (but I think there’s only the original manga). So much for wanting to stop buying Japanese novels.

Would 9/10 recommend this.

คู่ไฟท์ไฝว้ผี / Let’s Fight Ghost

It’s a Thai remake of Korean drama 싸우자 귀신아 and both are available on Netflix Singapore. It started out SOOOO GOOD but unfortunately I got a little bored at the last arc. (Slight spoilers ahead). The villain arc was rather weak in my opinion and his backstory is not very fleshed out. I found him creepy at first but afterwards, I don’t know if we are meant to sympathise with him or hate him. Numwan’s a great character and I thought it was a pity that her story with Dr Jade had so much potential to be better. I thought she will go either the evil route or be the catalyst for Dr Jade’s redemption but sadly it just ended quite flat. I thought she would come back as a ghost! It’s also interesting how this story is about ghosts but none of the characters Dr Jade killed come back as ghosts.. I mean if that’s how it’s supposed to be, I’m fine with it, but there’s no explanation. The climax fell flat for me and I found myself fast-forwarding through the big fight and the final arc where Jeen had to go overseas to study (like seriously…). For a drama that I was rooting so hard for at the start, it was disappointing that I couldn’t sit through the last episode without the fast-forward button. But then again, it’s still worth a watch!

8.5 / 10 (simply cos the ending is … flat)

Vincenzo

Despite the hype, I have yet to feel invested in the show after 3 episodes. I’m contemplating to drop it, but the sheer curiosity of its popularity (recommended to me by both Korean and non-Korean friends) has kept me going.

I need more drama / anime recommendations! Send them my way please.