Epilogue

Epilogue
We have reached the end of our journey. After visiting your
colossal lifelong memory, your breathtaking speech
segmentation skills, your frantic reading speed, and your
pronunciation acrobatics – all unique on Earth – let’s sit down
for a moment.
Two hours of reading have changed the way you see languages
and language learning. Not all languages are equal because,
depending on who you are and which languages you speak, some
languages are easier than others. However, all languages are
equally beautiful. Germans will appreciate that Turkish is as
beautiful as German; French people will be delighted that Arabic
is as expressive and gentle as French; and Italians will be pleased
to discover that Albanian is as subtle and amusing as Italian.
Even more importantly, we have seen that languages are within
the reach of everybody. Please pass this knowledge on to your
children, grandchildren, and friends.
Although language learning is predictable, there are no
miracles. Success is determined by the number of hours people
are ready to invest. Fortunately, there are potent catalysts, for
example life and love. Just imagine yourself in an intense love
affair, spending weeks and months in close symbiosis, exposed to
a single linguistic ‘source’, discussing the world from dusk to
dawn, and all this submerged in memory-stimulating emotions,
supplemented with memory-boosting physical activity. The
progress people make in these conditions is remarkable –
sometimes dangerously remarkable. I once unmasked a cheating
husband. While talking about Italy and Italian, I noticed that his
language skills were quite honourable, so I asked him,
– How long have you been studying Italian?
– Oh, not that long. Three years, during my summer seminars.
– And how long did those seminars last?
– Two weeks each.
– Oh, really? I didn’t know that you had a girlfriend in Italy.
– Who told you?
Nobody told me. The gentleman was simply too erudite. You
don’t acquire certain words and a certain ease with language in 6
weeks of canonical summer-school teaching. Cherchez la
femme...
I have already recommended extensive travel for those who are
in their late teens or early twenties. Youth, high levels of sex
hormones, and the desire to find mates, are mighty
communication catalysers. However, love and sex are not always
practical. Later in life, you wouldn’t want to get divorced just
because you needed extra-marital language courses. For more
composed people, there are entertaining alternatives, such as
organised travel tours. I once went to Brazil and booked a 12-day
tour in a local tourist agency. All other travellers being Brazilian,
the 5,000 km bus trip (yes, Brazil is a vast country) turned out to
be second among the most intensive languages courses I have
ever had. (Number 1 was the French teenager, of course.)
You will have noticed that I have a special relationship with
languages. In fact, they have shaped my life through an
uninterrupted chain of 40 years that links my early Latin
experiments to The Word Brain. An A grade in Latin helped me
enter medical school. After medical school, I worked in a
department of infectious diseases and started writing a textbook on HIV (www.Amedeo.net/s.php?s=6) that was republished in
the 16 editions. The textbook triggered the construction of
www.Amedeo.com that, in turn, provided the funding for a 24-
month Arabic sabbatical. And struggling with Arabic taught me
fundamental lessons for writing this guide.
I am well aware that some of my advice is demanding and that I
have set the bar rather high. However, the bar is no higher than
we can all reach. The most satisfying insight of the last two
hours is that language learning is a mere variable of time: you
may decide that you have no time, but never again will you need
to say that you have no talent for it. If, instead, you find the time
to learn a new language, I wish you the very best. Languages are
formidable windows to the beauties and mysteries of the human
odyssey. Pushing them wide open is among the most gratifying
moments in life.








TheWordBrain2015