Why You Can Never Say You’re Fluent in Japanese
Understanding culture is as important as learning vocabulary and grammar
When I first moved to Japan, I was often confused. Whenever I asked anyone if they could speak English, the answer would inevitably be “Sukoshi dake” (Just a little).
As we started talking, I’d find the person understood a lot more than they professed. At a minimum, everyone had 6 to 10 years of English classes. While they might have difficulty conversing, they knew English grammar better than me.
Occasionally I’d meet someone who despite the usual protests, turned out to be completely fluent. It took a while to learn they’d spent a whole year in California or 6 months on a working holiday in Australia. One person who claimed she knew sukoshi dake actually had a master’s degree in English literature and could quote Shakespeare and Virginia Woolf. In a British accent.
So why didn’t they answer that their English was pretty darn good? Or that they’d scored 960 on the TOEIC?
At first I thought this was Japanese perfectionism. Anything less than perfect didn’t seem to count. A 960 TOEIC score wasn’t 990. Or they had trouble distinguishing L and R.
