Opening – Why I began writing this blog.

Hi! How are you?

Welcome to my blog called “The Challenge of Learning US English”. Why did I begin this blog? I have had many thoughts about learning English that I’d like to share. I began to write these thoughts in an article, but then I realized that one article wasn't enough. Instead, I would need to write a series of 2-3 entries. However, a series was still not enough. My ideas were like a tree and new branches of thoughts continuously sprouted from my mind. So why not begin my own blog about it? Some of my topics are serious, some of them are just for fun.

First of all, let me give you some details. I’m 45 and I’ve been learning English for ages. I started at the age of 12, but had many breaks. If I added up my most active periods of learning, the total wouldn’t be more than 4-5 years.

During this long period of time, I’ve met several challenges. I intentionally wrote the word challenge, not the word difficulty. A challenge has the power to push you forward and motivate you. To learn a foreign language is not easy, but it’s beautiful. It’s a discovery of a different culture, a different people. I’d like to show how I discovered (and am continuing to discover!) this beautiful language. I’m not a native speaker and I’m not a perfect English speaker. Nor am I a teacher. So I'm not interested in teaching English at all. Instead, I would like to show language learning from the perspective of a language learner.

I’m going to post my favorite books, websites, TV shows, and other material related to my learning process. I’ll show you my successes and experiences (I’ve had a lot!). I've also had pitfalls and several misunderstandings (when I misunderstood someone, or I was misunderstood). I won’t keep them in secret since they’re also important when learning English.

I do love all kinds of English, but I’m going to concentrate on American English. So I’m going to follow the American spelling rules and try to use the words, phrases, and idioms of American English. I'm focusing on American English because of the great opportunity I had to spend 4 months in the States in 2013.

How frequently will I write posts? I don’t know yet. I plan to publish normal entries once or twice a week.

Please feel free to make comments or contact me. I don’t guarantee that I can answer every question, but I hope there will be comments from native speakers as well, maybe from teachers, and maybe they can answer some questions as well. I would like to help people  discover English together.

This entry is reviewed and edited by gardeniafly. She’s graduating this year with a B.A. in Comparative Literature from the University of Georgia (United States).  She is not searching new students anymore. But I can recommend someone else, or you can visit Italki. She’s very kind and patient. I do hope we can work together on my blog project for a long period of time.

Her comments:

As a language learner myself, I can understand the difficulties of learning a new language. I'd like to help people who seek to fully imbue themselves in the English language. From talking with Attila, I've gained this wonderful opportunity to help him with this blog. I'd like to continue to help him and all of you in your English learning jouney and I look forward to my future involvement in the editing of this blog!

Bye-bye!

 Attila