Le Français est impressionnant! (French is awesome!)

I started learning French using the Rosetta Stone computer program the other day, and I really like it! I feel like I've learned so much already; no wonder the program costs like $500 (about $250 per level if you buy them separately). Luckily, Jeff already owned the first two levels, so those will keep me busy for awhile.

The program uses "total immersion" teaching tactics, which means it doesn't translate or explain anything in English; you have to figure out what things mean by using the French and pictures alone. At first I was kind of skeptical about this as I've always thought it's better to learn a bunch of vocabulary and grammar before you actually start putting the words together, but I feel like I'm learning so much faster this way without seeing any conjugation charts or grammar rules. There are times when I really want to ask a question about such things, but as I go along, I usually tend to figure it out myself.

Being already able to speak German fluently and having so much prior exposure to Spanish is definitely an advantage when learning French this way as I already understand the concept of words having genders, adjective endings depending on gender, different forms of "you," etc. There are also a lot of French words that are similar to or the same as German and Spanish words, many of which are just pronounced somewhat differently.

My biggest challenge though is reading the words with silent letters. Based on what I've learned, a very large percentage of French words have letters at the end that are silent. Also, French combines a lot of words together in the form of contractions, but they are unlike the contractions we have in English, so it's a bit hard to get used to.

The program has voice recognition capability, so when it says something in the language and you repeat it (or try to), it can tell if you said it right or not, and will make you repeat it until you get it right (or give up). It's like having a native French speaker all to yourself.

The cool thing about learning French here is that it is an official language of Canada, and there are many people here who actually speak it as their native language with whom I could practice. Before coming here, I didn't realize that 23% of the Canadian population, about 7 million people, speak French fluently! Going to Montreal or anywhere else in Québec and being able to speak it there would be particularly chock full of awesome.

Additionally, it also helps that the text on the majority of product packages and signage throughout Canada is written in both French and English. I've learned a few words just by reading that (i.e. Pâte de Biscuits = cookie dough).

Through this two official languages phenomenon and several other factors, I'm beginning to recognize that Canadian culture isn't only similar to the US, but primarily a combination of US and European culture with original Canadian characteristics mixed in. You add stuff from plethora of other immigrants in there and that makes things even more interesting. Perhaps Canada is the best of all worlds. Of course there are problems where the cultures clash or whatever, but overall I am finding the immense amount of multiculturalism amazing.