How I Taught Myself Italian
Learning a language without a course or mentor
Embarrassed that I only spoke one language, as a youth, I vowed to learn a second language should I ever travel to a foreign country.
For my wife’s 50th birthday, she requested we travel to Italy.
I tried to talk her into visiting England and Scotland. No deal. I was going to have to learn Italian.
Although these are not spoken languages, I had taught myself many programming languages including: C, C++, RPG, JavaScript and Cobol. That’s what I figured I’d do again. Teach myself.
A Book, a Podcast, and Google Translate
I started with a simple language book. But that was too simple. I wanted to be conversant. I bought a $10 audio course for my low-budget MP3 player (this was early 2000s). I was an avid cyclist with 1–2 hours six days a week of cycling. The audio course went well so I sprung for a couple more $10 to $20 audio courses.
I love to read so I figured I’d leverage Google Translate. I’d find online books, in English of course, and run Google translate over it.
