languag lerning

Interesting fact about learning languages: it's hard and it takes a long time. Shocking, I know.

I've been learning Japanese v e r y s l o w l y for the past year or so, taking it more seriously in the past month or so in my now copious free time. Mostly I've been drilling kanji (characters) and watching anime and dramas which I understand like 10% of. Still moderately enjoyable, especially when a whole exchange is comprehensible. Wow, it's like I'm really learning a thing!

Naturally, having attained a minimal amount of success in an area, it's time for me to overcommit my energies to expand my efforts in that area until I inevitably burn myself out (eh, it's pretty evitable). What I mean is that now I'm learning French too. Originally it was Dutch, but my brother objected. The plan is that we both learn a language so that we can communicate with each other in public without anyone else understanding unless we're in Montreal. Also there's a long running joke involving my inability to speak French but I won't get into that. There is a point to be made that no one particularly cares what we are talking about to each other, but who knows what might happen in the future. Perhaps we will be under risk of surveillance by unFrench-speaking secret agents. Best to plan ahead.

The interesting thing here is that I don't know how to proceed. I mean obviously it involves some amount of French media being input into me through my eyes and/or ears but which media and in what order? I have previously obtained the Assimil New French With Ease which is supposed to be pretty good, but I'm gravitating towards this 1968 "La francais dans l'methode naturale" or something like that. Give me a break, I've been studying for about ten minutes. This drew my attention because it's in the same pattern as Orberg's Lingua Latina Per Se Illustrata, a wonderful Latin textbook which I read after I finished my high school Latin courses and then regretted not finding out about earlier. The idea is that the whole text is in French, including the instructions and explanations of grammar. In Latin that worked well, though maybe because I already had a background in Latin, shaky though it was. I guess I'll see if it works for me in French. If my brother doesn't change his mind about the language again.