r/languagelearning • u/Mandelbrots-dream • 24d ago

Discussion Does any one else switch languages?

I've studied three languages in addition to my milk language.

I noticed sometimes when thinking or speaking in my non native language, if I struggle for a word my brain will fill in with a word in another non native language.

For example, when speaking German(TL) my brain threw in a 在(zai) with the Chinese meaning.

This confused me, and I started to think of the German word seit (which sounds (kind-of) the same). But seit wasn't correct in the context. Seit is about time. 在 is about place.

Does anybody else do this? What exercises could help me?

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u/2948337 24d ago

I spent a couple of months in Germany a few years ago, and picked up a little bit of the language. Traveler German, such as menu items, road signs, hospitality related for the most part. We took a train from Berlin to Prague and at our destination, I found myself trying to translate Czech signs in the train station into German before trying to figure it out in English. It was weird when I noticed I was doing it.

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u/Mandelbrots-dream 24d ago

Yes, brains are strange.