For a year and a half now, I've been learning Dutch. Before moving to the Netherlands, I had no desire to learn another language. But, my employer pays for the lessons that I'm required to take. With Afrikaans as my home language, getting started with Dutch was easy. And then, it wasn't. Through the struggle, I'm now registered to write my B2 exams in June and have a greater appreciation for what it takes to learn a language. More than that though, I understand now that learning a language is so much more than just learning a language. And, I'm more open to learning another language. Next time though, I'd like to choose it, rather than for it to choose me.
I grew up in an Afrikaans household. Afrikaans is the youngest language in the world at around 100 years old. And it was born from the Dutch, French, and German colonizers in South Africa in the 17th and 18th centuries. Consequently, I got a massive head start with my Dutch terminology. So many words I could understand because they were the same or similar in Afrikaans. Occasionally, this would have an undesired effect - for example, the word "opgewonde" in Afrikaans simply means "excited"; in Dutch, "opgewonden" is more often used as "aroused". Definitely a dangerous trap to step in, with the wrong context. In any case, Afrikaans gave me a platform to have rudimentary conversations in Dutch, even early on, and spared me the pain of learning a new vocabulary from scratch.
That said, because Afrikaans is so young, it's a modern language. It does without many of the grammatical frills of Dutch if they're not absolutely necessary in conveying some meaning. For example, nouns in Afrikaans have no "de" or "het" prefixes, and verb conjugations are far fewer and less complex than in Dutch. I imagine this makes it easier to learn Afrikaans. But, it definitely doesn't make it easier to learn Dutch if you're already accustomed to the simplicities of Afrikaans. I've heard native Dutch speakers describe someone speaking Afrikaans by saying that "they sound like they're a mentally challenged Dutch person." So, at a point, learning Dutch from an Afrikaans background can make things more difficult. It definitely did for me. There are many times when I'm sure that I'm speaking perfectly good Dutch, but the look on people's faces tells me that I sound like a drunkard.
Still, I've arrived at a place where I can keep up with Dutch conversation in most settings. And that's allowed something to happen. It's allowed me to better understand Dutch culture. Dutch expressions like "doe normaal dan doe je al gek genoeg" (be normal, that's crazy enough) speak to the inclination of Dutch society to frown upon extremes - don't be too rich or too poor; don't work too hard or be too lazy; don't dress outlandishly; have ambition, but know your limits - there are so many dimensions across which this spans. To me, the Dutch language focuses more on fact than feeling - it's not common to say "I feel like..." - which I'm sure relates to the perception of Dutch people as being direct. However, there's still charm in words like "gezellig," which many Dutch people will tell you has no direct translation in English, but speaks to an event that was enjoyed as a collective, where pleasant conversation likely flowed, and people would be happy to do again.
A part of me is saddened that it took me moving abroad to learn a new language and appreciate how it helps understand the intricacies of a culture. But I'm grateful that it happened. For if I return to South Africa, where we have 11 official languages, I'd want to learn the language of another South African culture. So that I may not just live past my neighbors, but live with them.
That's all for now. Doei doei!
"If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his own language, that goes to his heart."
- Nelson Mandela