So this will be an unusual “success update”. But I signed up for an account almost exactly two years ago (the 19th apparently). At that time I had just started learning Swedish and Norwegian, and was, at best, an A2 in German despite 10 years of trying to learn. Now I am the president of the technology committee for one of the two churches in the US that operates primarily på norsk.
Today, I got the opportunity to talk to the crew from NRK and (more importantly) be a few feet away from hennes Majestet Sonja av Norge as she visited Mindekirken for its centennial!
Unfortunately, I was under no circumstances allowed to take a selfie with her. But I can be seen in the background of Kveldsnytt (and mostly likely Dagsrevyen in a few hours)!
I really have to thank LingQ for making an accessible tool that was instrumental in getting my learning off the ground. It has opened a lot of opportunities for me that I never could have imagined!
Yes, we spend so much time discussing the optimal and best ways to learn that I think sometimes we lose sight of “why” we are learning in the first place. People hopefully aren’t passing B2 tests for the sake of passing a B2 test, but rather because by putting in that work their lives will be enriched by the new things they will gain access to.
For all you know, she was happy to be in a room with you too!
Maybe she was thinking, I can’t believe I have all this pomp and circumstance; I’d much rather break away from it all and get to know that tall, young, information technology polyglot over there.
Me, I’d rather meet the Statsminister. She’d be interesting to speak with for sure.
BTW, Norwegian B2 is my only language certificate.
Jeg hoper du får sjansen til å bruke det :). Det er morsomt du sier jeg er høy. Vanligvis tror jeg ikke det pga alle brødrene mine er høyere, men når jeg så dronningen tenkte jeg, åh hun er kortere enn jeg forventa.
Congratulations on your success! I’m amazed at the amount of work you’ve put in and it’s great to see how that success and hard work has resulted in life changing results…from language! So cool.
I am sure I am just repeating what I said a year ago, or probably even before that, but I think moments this are what exactly what most people are after! Ultimately what I would ask anyone, how is acquiring a language enriching and widening your life?
I got to have a short lunch with the Prime Minister, nerd out a little about utenrikspolitikk, have him meet my son, meet his staff, speak with the ambassador to the US, and of course alt på norsk.
I missed the post at the time, but so cool, congrats!
True success is also a dish best served cold. Few things in the world come close to these moments of realization that your long-term dreams have finally come true and all the hard work you’ve been putting in is starting to pay off, sometimes in unexpected and surprising ways.
I’m still on my way to major expected and unexpected effects. Minor ones are like when I would occasionally translate prints on someone’s T-shirts. Like my friend’s wife, after having a huuuge fight with him, had bought him a T with “TIME TO LET GO OF THE PAST AND MOVE ON” on it and had no idea what was written there
Some of the learning skills I’ve got helped me realize I can apply them to the other aspirations of mine, not just to language learning. And a lot of other collateral benefits.
Congratulations. This was very nice to read indeed.
So wise and true. I’m definitely in the process to revisit all my “whys”. I believe many things will change for me in the next months, including my language learning priorities. Sometimes life changes but we get stuck with past goals or we are unable to move forward and accept or embrace the change.
I hope you will have other moments like this that will give you much satisfaction for your hard work.
