The mountain takes shape

There's some force in life in almost everywhere that I've looked that seems to keep everything normal and nothing extraordinary seems to happen. Sure that sounds cynical but let me give some examples before you dismiss this observation

a person goes to the gym expecting huge body changes and they achieve a minor improvement in appearance or supposing there are big changes, in the end, that person will revert back to their normal body after a some period. They expected to come out of the experience lean or very muscley.

another person goes to study at University. They expect that after they graduate from the 4 year course they will become an expert on their degree. However by graduation they realise that while the course was challenging, they now are just beginners in their field. The universe has not opened up to them through their graduation. With their new found education they can't suddenly come up with a an idea that changes the planet or saves a million lives.

someone starts at a new challenging job that seems like the start of some huge. In the beginning they expect that after a few years they will be extremely valuable to their employer and capable of enviable productivity improvements and able to sprout vast knowledge on cue. Again, after 3 years that person realises that it's just a job and the achievements of the past 3 years have only been minor and hard fought.

a student starts studying a foreign language after being literally awestruck at how impressive it sounded to hear a native speaker of the student's own language able to converse in this foreign language. The student studies one night a week for 3 semesters in an adult education class and then embarks on self tuition through spending hundreds and hundreds on "Learn language now!!", "Mastering this foreign language in 30 days" etcetera etcetera. A year is spent and conversation skills and vocabulary have improved but the student's view of the Arabic world hasn't changed too much. The student can't now see more clearly what could convince Arabs that Islam is wrong, or for that matter, convince himself that Islam is right. A 'roadmap to peace' isn't any clearer than it was 3 years ago.

So what is the cause of this 'force'? Is the underlying problem that the person is normal so therefore all achievements can only be normal? Or is it that the expectations are enormously overscaled, even arrogant? Or maybe it's not so much that the expectations weren't not met, perhaps it's that the changes are hard to spot differences because they're gradual. Perhaps the only thing missing is lasting commitment in the gym, at the desk or in the workplace.

I prefer to think that the assessment of the achievements is lacking, as well as the period required to reach these achievements is unrealistic. Ahh realistic, exactly the world I'm trying to avoid. But that's the problem too - if our expectations are not realistic then we are living in a fantasy. Hmm I'm beginning to trip over logic related to the definitions of words now. By realistic, normal etc. I am referring to habit of many to reduce life experiences into simple, tangible tiny little pieces of mush that fit more nicely in the brain. Some brains are addicted to normalcy and are 99% dedicated to predictable experiences. Put that brain in an unpredictable situation and it will either reject it and flee or it will try to fit an existing normal pattern to the experience that doesn't truly fit.

For example I know of someone who visited Egypt and at first it appeared the entire experience had opened his mind to something new. It appeared that he realised that there was more to life than computers and profit and acquiring possessions and there's more than just a western way of thinking. Don't settle for a plain old existence until you kark it - go out there and get challenged. I have no doubt that was his initial shock but then when he got home to comfortable old Australia he dumbed down his experience to a fantasy. He said he wasn't living a real life in Egypt - that was holiday, it was fantasy. There was nothing more to Egypt than what you have here in Australia. Stay where he is, everything stays normal, comfortable and predictable --> brain stays happy.

But anyway, I digressed slightly. Back to the topic.

I was searching for this blog on google to see if it was actually possible for anyone out there to find my blog and read it. But all I found instead was
http://www.gapschool.net/How_much_Arabic_can_I_learn/How_much_Arabic.htm

It's a language school based in the UAE which tries to answer the question of how much study will bring about fluency in Arabic. It says foreign languages to English can be classified into 4 groups...

Group One, the easiest languages for a native English speaker to learn, contains languages such as French, Swedish and Spanish. Group Two contains languages such as German, Hindi and Urdu. Group Three contains languages such as Bengali, Nepali and Turkish. Finally, Group Four, the hardest languages for a native English speaker to learn, contains Arabic along with Chinese, Japanese and Korean.

and goes on to say

If you compare the graph above with the table below you will see that the FSI considers it would take an average language learner between 100 and 150 weeks at 30 hours per week to attain superior status (3 to 3+) which is the lowest level most of us would call fluent. This is a bit more than the 3 months quoted by some programmes! Beware of programmes who play with words to get your money, the only way to get a good standard of Arabic is time and effort and a good programme.

Owch! 150 weeks or 3 years of fulltime study to reach fluency. So that there is my Everest. I was daunted about it when I read it but I'm coming to think I have already started climbing that mountain. Being half Lebanese and exposed to some Arabic throughout my life I have good familiarity with the sounds and a passion for the language. Maybe after a year of solid study I will be happy with my proficiency. I want to reach a level where I can read newspapers, understand tv and participate in conversations well enough that I can learn in a natural setting ie. not out of language books but by being immersed in the real thing.

But to boost my confidence again I found another site talking about the demand in the US for people to learn Arabic in the interests of national security.

http://www.campus-watch.org/article/id/1445
Demand for Linguists Far Outweighs Supplyby Harry LevinsSt. Louis Post-DispatchDecember 12, 2004
http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/emaf.nsf/Popup?ReadForm&db=stltoday%5Cnews%5Cstories.nsf&docid=F2C1DF5D5633581286256F69001DEE45
People who can read, write and speak Arabic are a key weapon in the war on terrorism. But they're in short supply.

America's intelligence agencies are scrambling for Arabic speakers. But the supply is held down by many factors, chiefly the sheer difficulty of mastering Arabic.

Kirk Belknap runs the government-financed National Middle East Language Resource Center at Utah's Brigham Young University, where he also teaches Arabic.

He says: "On the advanced level, it would be good if we were cranking out 300 a year nationally. We're lucky right now if we're producing more than 40 graduates a year with fully competent language ability." Even 40 may be an optimistic estimate. In "The 9/11 Commission Report," the authors write, "The total number of undergraduate degrees granted in Arabic in all U.S. colleges and universities in 2002 was six."

One gauge of the difficulty of Arabic comes from spokesman Steve Pike of the State Department. In Arlington, Va., that agency also runs its own language school, with 3,500 students - 301 of whom are studying Arabic, up from 133 before Sept. 11, 2001.

"French or Spanish is a 24-week course," Pike says. "A harder language, like Russian, takes 44 weeks. And for four languages - Arabic, Chinese, Japanese and Korean - the course is 88 weeks.".

Brigham Young's Belknap plays down the difficulty but points out another challenge. "With Arabic, it's more about time than difficulty," he says. "It's the amount of what you have to learn, not the difficulty."

and how 'bout that. My motive for learning Arabic is the most common one -

Students who try to learn Arabic do so for a variety of motives. Forest Park's El-Hage Chehade says that by far, most have a blood or personal relationship with an Arabic speaker - a spouse, a boyfriend or girlfriend, a parent and so on. Among them is Leslie Khoury, 20, of University City, whose father emigrated from Lebanon. "I was raised with the Lebanese dialect" of Arabic, Khoury says. "Over the years, I lost a lot of it. But after my folks got divorced, I moved back in with my dad, and I learned it once more. Now I want to learn how to read and write Arabic."

And Arabic transmits in a special rhythm. Military writer Ralph Peters once traveled the world as an Army intelligence officer. He says, "It's commonly accepted among scholars that spoken Arabic, when wielded well, can rivet and intoxicate listeners."

Too true about the last part there. I've been intoxicated by the rhythm and beautiful sound.

It's my hope that a similar linguist shortage exists here in Oz and I might be able to find a scholarship or a job that will pay me to learn the language. I know ASIO is looking for people, Arabic is sure to be an area they'd want covered. The other avenue is ADFA (Australia Defence Force). The wages are pretty poor for a linguist there however, it's just general entry not officer entry and I'd need to pay 6 years back with service. No thanks. It would be terrible to be part of a military force in the Middle East that I don't agree with.

So thar she be. A grade IV mountain that may take 3 years to get near the top of. I'm up for the hard work though and the skill would clearly be an asset in my career.