xShimusx

Another reason is for jobs. Jobs everywhere these days will take bilingual or better people way ahead of average joe A on the street. The culture barrier helps too, as well the general feel-good of knowing you could converse at any time with someone around someones head (kidding.) Other than that, it always helps if you learn the language of the places you want to go on vacation, etc too - once again culture barrier. It'll make your stay more enjoyable.

Spring has treasures told Gently birthed from the first rain Dandelion Gold Summer Sensations Promising Pastel Colors Cozy Carnations Couple of the ones about flowers I enjoy. Hana of many iro.

Couple more: "Common Sense is not that Common" - Voltaire "Not all those who wander are lost. - J.R.R. Tolkien" --J. R. R. Tolkien from the book The Hobbit

Jaime Lannister in "A Song of Ice and Fire" "So many vows ... they make you swear and swear. Defend the king. Obey the king. Keep his secrets. Do his bidding. Your life for his. But obey your father. Love your sister. Protect the innocent. Defend the weak. Respect the gods. Obey the laws. It's too much. No matter what you do, you're forsaking one vow or the other."

Why put an "or" in there? Some of my favorite shows and books involving monsters are also a very psychological romp through the thriller portion of the show. A good example of this if you like anime is "Parayste - The Maxim" about parasites who come down from the sky and burrow into humans, taking them over. They coexist with us and feed on us like livestock. It makes you think, and you experience the gamut of the feeling spectrum.

Jon Snow, A Song of Ice and Fire book series (More commonly known as HBO's "A Game of Thrones") He was a bastard child, left to fend for himself. He takes a pledge and heads up into the wintery hellhole that is "The Wall" where he's berated and cut down until eventually through testing, trials, he becomes the Lord Commander there. It's a nice story of how even lowborn people can rise to a high station if well respected.

For English classes in High School, I loved "Lord of the Flies" For my personal reading, anything by George R.R. Martin (A Song of Ice and Fire series - more commonly known as HBO's "A Game of Thrones") and Michael Moorcock's "Elric Of Melnibone"

I think people find it easier because writing it down you can see the letters (or symbols) that make certain sounds. Then your brain recognizes this fact and puts two and two together when you're reading. Then you may just happen to lose confidence when speaking it because you don't have the paper to look at and your brain isn't coping with the information as much as you can speak it. Could be wrong. Maybe someone else knows?

I learned simple Japanese phrases by watching anime, and listening to how they phonetically pronounce everything and with my limited understanding of Romaji, I was able to talk and sing in Japanese perfectly. I've even gotten stared at a couple times. I may not understand the entirety of what I'm singing, but I can almost perfectly mimic syllables and pronunciations for different words down.

Hey Robert. I'm Shane. I'm an America who is just fat and lazy who is deciding to learn another language to bolster my ability to speak in Bilingual if not higher translations. I always thought it'd be fun to learn and just learn so many different cultures and how to speak Japanese. Nice to meet you Hope to see you around the forums some.

Why? Because it was my heritage. I felt I should put some effort to learn the language where my ancestors came from (at least 50% of them, anyways). There's even a town/river in Germany named "Dahle" which is my last name. I soon after taking two years in high school switched. They're much too harsh on proper sentence structure and after speaking it and writing it for such a short time I couldn't really put phrases together anyways, but I could understand it if it was being spoken.

Less of a "Manga" and more of a "Light Novel" I loved To Aru Majustsu no Index and the concept of the kids having ranked level powers. Also, Spice and Wolf is another fantastic example from a Light Novel. For Manga itself, I concur with Bakuman. Who can't like one of the writers at least. I'm a sucker for a good story. Another one I was reading was a Korean Manwha named "Noblesse" (Vampires and such but done well). I enjoy reading manga, manwha, and light novels. It helps accentuate my breaks between gaming and anime and trying to work and learn Japanese.

Definitely true. This is one of the smallest cities I've currently lived in (Edinboro, PA) but the diversity the college brings in is really unique. From the Koreans and Japanese to various other Asian Ethnicities and then right next to them the Mexican minorities. In a very redneck northern PA town. Like farmers type rednecks. It's interesting to see how we all coexist and learn from each other. And I just don't mean the different restaurants, either. I mean wholesome good education.

That's essentially what I've done. I've played so many Japanese betas (with no translation patches) that I have to puzzle out which katakana/hirogana in it in relation to what stats (Str, Dex, etc) and then when they fully voice it, and it's not subbed I feel I can understand the generals of the conversation. Don't ask me to respond, however. That's still a bit beyond me But yeah, I've been touching up with some vocab words and pounding the Romaji into my head for how to spell certain ways.

Since we're a melting pot, the language gap and barrier is huge. I would say very huge. But in small towns, even though change is feared outside minorities have a better time making it. We're more apt to sit down and try to have a full conversation because these are people we will keep dealing with. It won't be immediate but if two cultures mix for any extended periods of time, naturally the barrier will become weaker by proximity and being able to pick up what other nationalities are saying.