Fire Your Language Tutor: I Found a Better Way...

     I suck at remembering things. I am much more likely to hold something firm in my mind after reading it and copying it down. Over and over. Pure memorisation. And truth be told- that only sticks around for a while. And I'm lazy. Why do I want to put so much effort into memorising something if it's just going to fade away after awhile? I do concepts, ideas, trends- those I understand. Facts, figures, dates, not so important to me. Sorry, was yesterday your birthday? At least I know that you are a thoughtful, passionate person who always remains positive and surprisingly open minded for someone of your religious persuasion. Ah shit- was that too blunt?

     I'm not a good listener either. Now, I am actually a bit hard of hearing, so I have a difficult time differentiating sounds; I don't always hear everything people are saying to me, and well, it's not that I'm narcissistic so much as I usually have a thousand things darting about my mind, and well, I just don't always have room for more. Many of my friends have noticed this- it's funny how they don't seem to realise that maybe they need to speak a bit more clearly to me, but are the first to point out that I haven't been listening to them, so of course I don't remember when they told me that thing the first time- or the second for that matter. Which is my point, I have an especially hard time remembering things when I hear them.

     All of these things make learning a new language a bit more challenging than it might otherwise be. I don't hear clearly exactly what people say. So even if I've learned a word, I may not recognise it spoken. Conversely, if I learn a word through constant spoken repetition, I will have learned it's significance, but when I try to use it, I am likely to mispronounce it. However, through divine intervention I have discovered a much more effective tool for retaining vocabulary in other languages: sex.

     The other evening, while viscerally enjoying the company of a good friend, he asked me a question in Spanish. While I hadn't yet learned the last word of the question, there was no doubt in my mind as to what I was being asked. Later, it occurred to me to look up the word. And while the dictionary definition is quite different from his meaning- it's not that difficult to see how the slang derived from the original meaning of the word. And I guarantee, I will never forget either meaning. Furthermore, I now have a clearer understanding of Spanish's inherent thought process (the etymology of the slang usage from its original meaning), and thus am one step closer to fluency. It's like, killing three birds with one stone.

     So the next time you think about taking classes or travelling to a new country to inundate yourself in a new language, perhaps it would be more fun to first try taking a lover who doesn't speak your native tongue.

Warning: this method has not been tested in other disciplines, and has only been proven effective for the learning of other languages. Use of this method for learning other than what has been suggested is done so at your own risk. Possible side effects of attempting this method of learning in other subjects include, but are not limited to: loss of sex drive when someone calls out, “what is the square root of pi?” and loss of lover when someone asks, “how many of his wives did King Henry VIII murder or have killed?”