Languages and Duolingo

Learning languages is my version of Candy Crush, a tidbit about myself I learned thanks to moving to a Brazilian neighborhood and Duolingo. At first, I started teaching myself Portuguese so I could speak to patients at work, but over the last year I've realized that keeping track of my Duolingo tree helps me relax during my commute. I started refreshing my Spanish, which has grown atrocious over the last decade and change.

And Duolingo works! Today, I facilitated a full conversation between my attending and a Brazilian woman eager to go home. Much to my delight, I clearly understood every single sentence from the woman (a native speaker of Portuguese). One of the first phrases I taught myself is "Se você fala devagar, eu comprendo". I didn't have to use it once today, though I still understand much more than I can say.

To congratulate myself, I decided to start my next Duolingo tree early. I'd planned to wait until my Portuguese tree was gilded, but since it looks like I can hold a conversation already, I went right on ahead and started German.

And it was a bit of a disaster. I didn't realize just how much knowing Spanish helped me with Portuguese until I read this:

From Duolingo's German "Basics" lesson. I didn't even grasp the English.

To be fair to myself, I did complete the lesson with a single error, and that was at the end of a very long day at work and after spending a good hour on Portuguese and Spanish. I'll continue at it and hopefully by next year I'll be able to understand a little bit of German.