If you could wake up tomorrow and be fluent in any language you don’t currently speak, which would it be? Why? What’s the first thing you do with your new linguistic skills?

If I could wake up tomorrow and be fluent in any language, I would like it to be in Japanese. Since childhood I’ve always been fascinated with the Japanese culture, history and its people. Also, my mother has been a resident of Japan for 26 years and my stepfather is Japanese and they are both fluent in Nihongo. I took a Japanese class at a community college back in 2003 and did really well. I learned how to speak in Japanese as well as to read and write in Hiragana and Katakana. I got college credits for the class and received an A+ at the end of the semester. Unfortunately, I did not continue to the next level because I was also working on obtaining my bachelor’s degree in Information Systems at the time while working part-time. There was not enough time in the day for me to fit in everything. I really enjoyed the Japanese class and would like to go back to school and continue learning. Since it’s been over a decade, I might have to go back to learning Japanese Level 1 again. I’ve forgotten most of it because I never get to use what I learned all the time. None of my friends and family here in the U.S. speaks Japanese and when I talk to my mother, she always speaks in either English or Tagalog. I think once my knowledge has been refreshed in Nihongo, the first thing I would do is call my stepfather. I know he’d be happy about it because when my fiance and I were visiting Japan two months ago, he said that hopefully on our next visit we’d be able to finally have a conversation in Japanese. I’m sure my mother would be glad too as she won’t be playing the “interpreter” anymore 😀 .

*DP