I spent about half my year in Japan and half my year in Sweden and I speak both languages. It's always shocked me how many expats feel it's not necessary to speak the language but the justifications are totally different.
In Sweden they say "Everyone here speaks English anyway"
In Japan they say "All of my friends are expats anyway"
I think if people don't want to learn a language they will come up with any excuse.
> I spent about half my year in Japan and half my year in Sweden and I speak both languages.
Yeah, I really doubt that you can move to Japan with zero Japanese and in half year learn enough to hold normal conversation and be able to read/write Japanese, all that while working full time and not being immersed every day in Japanese language course.
It's perfectly possible to learn a language in 6 months if you spend a lot of your time conversing in it, avoiding English as much as possible. They also said "speak", not "write". It's possible and even natural to learn one and not the other.
Almost anything is possible, even time travel, it's just not very realistic under certain circumstances. In case of learning Japanese in 6 months while working full time in English speaking enviroment with 0 Japanese foundations to start with.
> Yeah, I really doubt that you can move to Japan with zero Japanese and in half year learn enough to hold normal conversation and be able to read/write Japanese, all that while working full time and not being immersed every day in Japanese language course.
If you're working full time in Japanese you could absolutely get conversational Japanese within half a year. Indeed I suspect that's the most practical way.
Happens all the time with menial or physical jobs where they're desperate for labour - construction, fishing, forestry, that sort of thing. You can't get a work visa for that kind of job, but if you have a visa for other reasons (spouse, child of Japanese national, etc.) they'll take you.
Yeah, but I assume in that case you don't talk much during the job and don't have really time to talk to practice the language, so it's complete circle - can't learn it in job which doesn't require the language, because there is no reason to use there language. Sure you could learn few phrases or at least improve your comprehension I guess, but I don't think you could get fluent after half year of such (hard) work.
Weird way to generalize the problem. The difficulty of learning Swedish is not the language itself, but because Swedes default to speaking English with you if they see you struggling. If you want to truly become fluent in Swedish you have to constantly ask them not to do that, and most expats get sick of it by the 10th or so time.
>I think if people don't want to learn a language they will come up with any excuse.
In a world where it was actually true that you don't have to learn the language wouldn't it appear that they always have an excuse not to? So how does your experience give evidence we're not in that world?
> It’s got to the point that in central Helsinki, you often can’t get service in Finnish in bars or restaurants.
That would really suck if you were a native Finn and don't speak english, and the service worker in your own country doesn't speak your local language.
On one hand it's just part of a continuum of language transitions in a city that never was monolingual or even Finnish-dominated for most of its history. 110 years ago many neighborhoods in Helsinki were majority Swedish-speaking and the official language mandated for the government was Russian. A lot of people spoke all three languages. (I'm 42, was born in Helsinki, and I remember from my childhood shops in fancier neighborhoods where the service was in Swedish.)
On the other hand it's a real shame that it risks sending Finnish into a vicious circle of decreasing usage: the elites start speaking English and working in English, and Finnish once again becomes the insignificant language of country bumpkins.
Between 1860 and 1940, the nation collectively worked very hard to "uplift" Finnish into a real written language that is actively used in literature, science, audiovisual culture, and so on. People translated their family names and started speaking Finnish to their children. I can see that work being undone over the next century. (My own two children probably would have lost the language if we hadn't returned to Finland now; we were living abroad for years and they'd already started talking English between themselves.)
This is also starting to happen in Prague city center, though the real reason is those overpriced tourist traps are not frequented by locals so there is no need for staff to speak local language, it should be enough warning for you (as local) that you are in tourist trap.
I've been to prague every few years for decades now, and the whole city center has become just a giant tourist trap. Sadly the same is happening to many other old european capitals to the point where they all look and feel the same... some old buildings, a river and tourist traps and scams.
I live in ljubljana, and the same is happening here too...
Prague, bratislava, budapest, vienna,... it's all the same.. buildings are slightly different, landmarks slightly different, but the general feeling inside the "old town" centers is the same... pretty much same restaurants selling same overpriced food, same stores selling same made-in-china souvenirs and some obscure "locally made" stuff that's useless and way too expensive, same boat tours, same bike/scooter guides, same weird hidden supermarkets for the last few locals still living there... same tourists, same loud spanish girls, same japanese people with huge cameras, same groups following the same guides holding up same flags and umbrellas not to be lost in the crowd, same tourist cards, same corruption with guides (recommending shitty restaurants that pay the guides to steer tourists there)... it's kinda sad to me personally... tourism has destroyed so much sadly.
If your Norwegian isn't good enough (even if it is just that one day or you are having a moment), folks quickly switch to English.
Some Norwegians have trouble understanding other Norwegians as well and wind up using English. Dialects vary greatly from the written language and they just sound... different. Children start learning when they enter school (6 years old) and I think half of the graffiti is in English.
That is certainly true, but your experience is quite different if you speak Swedish or not. I definitely experienced a barrier when I mostly spoke English. I was working in an environment where everyone was speaking English, so it was harder to learn Swedish, however my relationship with swedes definitely improved after I tried to use more Swedish.
A lot of countries require a certain level of language knowledge to gain permanent residency. I can't imagine Sweden is too different than its western neighbor, where I have and still reside. I guess they realized that they aren't moving and need to have a plan when they retire? (I did read something in Norwegian immigration rules that it is possible if someone has lived for a significant amount of time, they can achieve permanent residency. Maybe there are stipulations. I don't know if the same thing is present in Sweden.)
It takes a bit a passion to keep on learning. I experience well enough, even though I still struggle with it. But living here, I do have a sense of FOMO though if I don't know what is happening where I live and having to be stuck translating everything or asking for summaries is extremely tedious.
I did think in the past that if universities require students to sit through local language lessons, in part to be prepared for other classes, what is the other part? My sense is that students have a lot of potential for local economies. The same "welfare" grant is rarely given by companies, where maintaining a workforce of contributing and skilled professionals could be equally as important. Yet, I found exactly one company in my own job searches that offer a stipend for a basic language course for a job that otherwise requires just English abilities. That actually sounds like an excellent job perk. This is really why people could sit 20 years without knowing more than a few phrases and can read signs. Maybe the cost of courses is not within a budget for something that is mostly optional for work life. But it is a damn shame anyway. For myself, I never took a course. I wish I did, but my language knowledge played a significant role in getting a lead developer position at a very good company (I kept saying in interviews that this is exactly something I want to improve :) )
Not only is there not much pressure, it's actually more difficult as Swedes are generally happy to speak English and will often switch as soon as your accent gives you away as a foreigner. After 15 years living here I am now fluent, it was a challenge though!
In Sweden they say "Everyone here speaks English anyway"
In Japan they say "All of my friends are expats anyway"
I think if people don't want to learn a language they will come up with any excuse.