The language mismatch

OK, so anyone who has ever tried to learn a new language knows that it is no easy task and plucking up the courage to speak this new language is terrifying.

I'm not terribly good with learning languages. I can barely speak Afrikaans (a well known language in South Africa); Oliver's (my boyfriend) family is German and over the years my ear for the language has developed but my ability to speak it is still shocking; and lastly, after living in South Korea for a year I was able to master a few basic phrases like hello, yes, no, how are you?, where is the toilet?, etc but even after a year speaking the language was no easy task.

So I have been in Sweden now for a month...how is my Swedish panning out? Well, I start formal lessons from the 31st of October so I have been doing self-study at home off of the internet....my vocabulary is getting better but my pronunciation needs a lot of work...which became apparent when I tried to read for some of my Swedish and Danish friends who were mystified by what I was trying to say and were in fits of laughter by how I was trying to say it.

Well, anyway...On Friday for lunch I went with a friend of mine, Nina, to buy a Kebab. Before I ordered I confidently said to her that I was going to order in Swedish....

I step up to the counter and say ein Kebab, the man starts speaking to me and I realise I understand what he is saying (I'm blown away....wow...my home studying has really paid off)...he is asking me what sauce I would like, I hear sharf which I know to be hot and I quickly stop him saying sharf in reply. He then repeats the order back to me and I say ne (which is yes in Korean). Realising my mistake I quickly say yes in English and then step aside waiting for the order to be made and I start giggling at my mistake...Nina then asks me why he was speaking German to me. Confused I realise that I had order ein kebab instead of ett kebab and the very well spoken kebab man had been speaking German to me which is why I understood what sauces he was listing....so much for my at home study lessons.

After that Nina and I were in fits of laughter....we couldn't contain ourselves. Keeping in mind that placing the order only took a few brief minutes this post barely does the situation justice....I was throwing around little bits of other languages and some how I still got the right order.

This wasn't the first time I got languages confused and I'm pretty sure it won't be the last....

Just wait till the next time someone gets me drunk or I'm overly tired, or I'm just not paying attention...they are going to have a poorly speaking Swedish, Korean, German, Afrikaans English person on their hands....