trilingual?! that's so cool! :D
(referring to the tags on this post, I guess? Hahaha.)
Yup! :) Well, Fukienese is technically a Chinese dialect, but it’s my first “language” so I’m not sure how that works. My parents spoke to me in Fukienese when I was a baby, but I apparently wanted to speak in English more, so they decided that my dad would speak to me in English while my mom would speak to me in Fukienese. So I’m fluent in both. :)
I picked up Tagalog a little bit later (because we didn’t use it much at home). I still speak it like a native might, but my vocabulary isn’t as deep and my grammar isn’t as proficient. But I’ve always been able to understand it/was always exposed to it. I just didn’t like speaking it when I was younger. :)
My fourth language is Mandarin. I spent 12 long years studying it in school (every afternoon for 2 and ½ hours), so I can understand, speak, and write it, but probably only at an elementary level (understand > speak > write).
I’m currently trying to learn French, but I think that might be a lost cause. :) I might just try to improve my Mandarin. (And learn ASL! I really want to do that.)The bad part about growing up trilingual/quadrilingual is that you don’t realize how hard it is to learn a language that you’re completely unfamiliar with until you actually try. :P I’ve heard that it’s supposedly easier for multilingual people to learn new languages, but I’m not so sure about that. :)
The fun part is code-switching, and mix and matching all three (sometimes four) languages with family and friends. :) Sometimes, we end up with four-word sentences with each word coming from a different language. :) Then we stop and realize what we just said and laugh.
I’m sorry for providing all this unsolicited information. Hahaha. I love talking about languages. I kind of vaguely recall your being interested in linguistics? (Or is my memory failing me yet again? Hahaha.) Do you speak other languages or are learning any now? :)
