Fun, Failure, and other F***s
English

Fun, Failure, and other F***s

by

language learning

Over the century I’ve been learning English, my approach to it has changed a hundred times. In the beginning, I took classes, did tons of drills, recorded myself (ew), recorded myself as an assignment (ew, ew), and did a lot more stuff I’m sure you can relate to.

I’ve never talked about my language learning journey (sorry — is there another expression for “language learning journey”? It just makes me feel like I’m Christopher Columbus boarding some kind of ship in search of something I don’t even know where it is).

Where was I? Oh, yes, I was about to talk about my story as an English learner. I promise I won’t say “I want to improve my English skills.” Oops — I let it slip. Anyway, at the end of the day, that’s exactly what I want.

I never really excelled in my on-again, off-again English classes, but there were people who actually did, and they all had one thing in common: they achieved amazing proficiency in English while having fun — playing video games, watching stuff online or on streaming platforms, or having a foreign partner. I already had a Spanish partner at the time, and I’m terrible at video games — not a big fan of Netflix either — so I was left with just one option: having fun.

“Having fun” can be seen as the umbrella term for almost everything. Some people enjoy bursting pimples, others like collecting coasters, etc. You just have to do all those things you love, in English. In my case, that means writing nonsense. I won't say that all I did before making this decision was a waste of time, but as sure as I'm sitting on a Pilates ball right now that its pretty close. So here I am — still learning, still confused, but at least having fun.

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