For my Oxford degree, I had to translate French and German philosophy (as it turned out, Descartes and Kant) at sight without a dictionary. That meant Germany for my first summer vacation, to learn the thorny language on my own.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
My mom taught me German before I knew English. And I went to French immersion school.
I wanted to learn a few foreign languages, and therefore I had to go abroad.
Sadly, my German is almost non-existent, although I did a little at school.
I joined a organisation called Wycliffe Bible Translators that had the objective of translating the Bible into all the languages of the world, and to do that you had to study linguistics, and so that was my initial exposure to linguistics.
I wanted as little formal linguistic theory as I could get by with. I wanted the basic linguistic training to do a translation of the New Testament.
I realized very early in life what my abilities and limitations were, and foreign languages was definitely one of my limitations. With strenuous effort, I just barely passed my French class at Harvard so I could graduate.
Columbia University, where I went to study in 1993, insisted its undergraduates learn a foreign language, so I discovered French.
Many of the books I read, I had to read them in French, English, or Italian, because they hadn't been translated into Spanish.
My most interesting correspondence is with my translators. I marvel at their sensitivity over certain passages that just anyone, even if he knows German well, would not appreciate.
I never had to learn English, French and German because I was brought up as all three languages. I had a private French teacher before I even went to school. That helped a lot.