Well, I started learning Romanian, my husband’s first language, so I can (hopefully, eventually) talk with his family (who is still in Romania).
After my first several lessons, I am confused, tongue-tied, and completely self-confident-less.
I’ve taken French before (in high school and college) but had a much easier time with it. I think it’s because in those classes, I was learning with a bunch of other beginners and we could all laugh with and at each other (good naturedly, of course!). Since I’m learning with a native-speaker this time, I’m finding the situation much different!
So can you tell me of when you were learning another language, so I don’t feel so, well, stupid?
I feel your pain! Keep it up though, it is worth it.
I learned Swedish in a similar situation to yourself, and made so many mistakes. I made a show of myself, everything I said wrong turned out rude! I mixed up words so that I told my grandparents-in-law that I had seen an asshole crossing the road, I told the mrs that I loved her with all my arse and I thanked my sister-in-law and her boyfriend for the shag instead of a lift in their car. I went the the library and asked for a “library horney” instead of a library card and I asked a busdriver if I could fuck from the busstop to the shops. The only mistake I made/make is to say that I walk to various destinations, no matter how far away they are (as in “I am going to walk to Australia next year”).
I can’t help you feel less stupid unfortunatly, but I can assure you that the vast majority of native speakers appreciate your trying to learn, and take the mistakes, even the rude ones, with a pinch of salt and a good hearty laugh. Keep up the good work, get him to buy you some books in Romanian, find some Romanian chat-channels online, see if there is some sort of Romania social club, church etc nearby that you could volunteer/hang out at for practise. Make him only reply to you in Romanian (unless he needs to practise his English). Once you get into the habit of using the language often it will improve in leaps and bounds.
Sometimes it’s a little too easy for native speakers to make non-native speakers feel stupid, because non-native speakers inadvertently say funny things. This is often because of idiomatic differences.
For instance, a non-native English speaker might say something like, “I enjoy to inhale the burning of the tobacco.”
Gee, Iteki maybe you wouldn’t have had so many problems if the person teaching you hadn’t taught you all those naughty words! So that’s my advice to you, liirougue don’t learn the embarassing words until you are more proficient!
Oh, and I hope someone other than your husband is teaching you…it can be harder to learn from a spouse than from an experienced teacher who knows how to teach the language, not just speak it.
According to the Marine Corps FOREIGN LANGUAGE PROFICIENCY PAY (FLPP) PROGRAM, Romanian is in Difficulty Category II and attracts a higher rate than Category I Languages such as Danish, Dutch, Italian, French, Spanish, Swedish etc.
I suspect the problem was similarities between naughty and non-naughty words, rather than knowing too many naughty words - röv/räv, stjärt/hjärta, skjut/skjuts, kåt/kort. The only one I didn’t get was the ‘fucking from busstop to shops’ one :D.