Ernesto

There may probably be some Celtic dialect similar to the English language but learning that wouldn't be of much use would it. The popular opinion is that German is similar to English, but I've had the experience with learning German and English really was of almost no use in the process. English, basic structure aside, has a lot of Latin vocabulary, so in my opinion you should have a shot at learning a Latin-based language because you wouldn't waste much time memorizing vocabulary that you already know in its English form. I find French to be pretty similar to English, vocabulary-wise.

This is the one thing that gets me stuck and my biggest criticism towards how teachers choose to teach languages: by hard hitting you memory, which you have so little of. I've done 2 semesters of German at university and it went terribly. The number one reason for this failure IMO is the way they tried to teach it, by simply speaking German non-stop at class and asking each time for you to memorize by heart this giant list of verbs/words etc, that you'd be tested on later. Nothing about the logic of the language, its syntax construction etc so you have something to start with and do not end up just memorizing stuff you don't understand and re-spitting from memory it whilst you have ZERO idea about it. That is not to mention that in my world, past the age of 14, asking me to memorize anything by heart amounts basically to an insult to my intelligence.

I am aware of this liaison problem for Spanish speakers who want to learn French and find it really odd, since I have the exact reverse problem with Spanish. I learned French first and in Spanish my mind just have a problem processing all the "se que es" etc which are just never concatenated like in French and one just ends up with over-abundance of "S"s and that is the single biggest problem for me currently when it comes to understanding oral Spanish when spoken at a fast pace (which sadly is 90% of the time ). The liaison thing is more of a hearing problem for Spanish speakers IMO since your mind is setup to process syllables differently, but for me I find the French liaison much more logical, and helps you avoid so many spelling errors.

Or are they just variations of one language? I am sure linguists would disagree but for me, Spanish, Portuguese and Italian (perhaps French also) are just variations of Latin. Speaking Spanish and Portuguese is not two languages proper but speaking one language with two different set of standards as far as I see it. I have a Bulgarian friend who had no difficulty learning Russian and a host of other Slavic languages. Added to English and French which he studied in school and that leaves him with about seven languages he can put in his CV and give people the appearance of a genius. He has no difficulty confessing that it is a bit "cheating" and that many Slavic languages are actually the same given different name just out of nationalistic fervor (as in Serbian and Croatian).

Well spot. I think I was hesitating between Japanese and Mandarin for the Bronze medal . (corrected now)

Not sure about the "follow your heart" approach, when it comes to languages I am of the school that a language is a as good as its economic prospects; what jobs/markets/opportunities it may open to you. Consequently, I am not one to recommend the very popular choice (at least here in the US) of French. French language is useless as far as economic opportunity is concerned...On the other hand, there are some languages of the future if you're concerned about learning an (economically) useful language, my list ordered according to personal insight: 1- Spanish 2- German 3- Japanese 4- Mandarin 5- Russian 6- tie between Arabic & Portuguese. If you speak the first 3 with English then you're probably a very rich man already