Dutch Language Review

All languages are truly beautiful on my mind, and although I think most people tend to lean towards the soft, smooth languages like Italian, I have always been drawn to and particularly fascinated by the guttural, harsh sounding languages, like Arabic. And I hadn't ever heard Dutch before, but I was watching a newscast and, listening in, discovered the language! I mean, I knew it existed, but I'd never heard it before then. I signed up on Duolingo, and I was off! I'm currently doing around 8-18 lessons on Dutch daily, and I created a Tumblr account for the sole purpose of communicating with native Nederlands speakers and to translate and truly become fluent in the language. In my opinion, Dutch is very easy, perhaps the easietc language I've ever learnt. It even tops the likes of Spanish! Although there are a few harsh sounds, they're fairly easier to get the hang of after some practice, and the hardest word for me to pronounce currently is sheep, or "schapp". A lot of words you can decipher simply because of how close in relation they are to English, and others sound like English words so much that they're easy to remember. The word order in Dutch is very similar to English as well, and the pace everything is spoken isn't too fast either. I'm more of a reader when it comes to learning new things, but Duolingo really helps to really hear the words only, for better understanding. I also am able to strike up a pretty good conversation with my sister, who responds the best she can (she sometimes learns with me). In terms of difficulty, it's probably a 1/5 for me, and I think if you studied daily, you could become fluent within a year or less! But if you do a few hours a day, like me, (I'm so hardcore), three to six months should suffice. And as a result of my practicing so long and tirelessly, whenever I switch into English, I have a moderate accent, which I really don't mind. After all, in my mind, English is just....boring. I mean, it's my native tongue. I'be always spoken it, so I guess I need a little something more exciting. Overall, Dutch is a rich and exciting language, and it's fairly easy to learn, with the added bonus of being able to communicate with people froom other cultures. Cheers to that!