Intercultural skills and experience abroad are no longer an added bonus on your resume in today’s job market. They are often a requirement.  In most industries, employers are now looking for someone who has spent time in another country, understands how different cultures see the world and can use those skills in the office. But what’s the best way to gain intercultural experience for your career while also improving your skills in a second language? Language immersion.

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Take a risk, dive into situations on a daily basis where you’ve got to speak the local language, regardless of how prepared you feel or how many verbs you know how to conjugate. I should warn you that language immersion is not always comfortable or easy though. It’s not as easy as sitting in the back row of your weekly Spanish class in the United States, avoiding eye contact with the teacher so you don’t have to speak and then leaving class to carry on with your evening in English. I am talking about living in your target language. If you’re up for the challenge, here are four ways to make language immersion work for you:

• Choose a language that grabs you and fits you: Everyone seems to be learning Chinese these days. I am sure there will be business opportunities in the future for those who learn Chinese. However, I have no plans to learn Chinese. It doesn’t grab my interest. Instead, I have learned Spanish through travel and language immersion in Latin America. Why did I choose Spanish? It fits my personality. From the beginning, I felt good speaking the Spanish language. It struck me as fun and expressive. It gave me energy. Native speakers complimented me and encouraged me to keep going. I reached a high level of Spanish because I chose the language that really interested me, not the language that is expected to become the future of international business. To build authentic professional skills, find out which language and which country fits you.

• Do what you love in your target language: When you go abroad to study a language, you don’t have to limit your formal language training to classroom learning. If you are in Buenos Aires and you’re interested in Tango, why not complement your Spanish class with tango lessons, in Spanish, at a traditional Milonga, a few times per week? Get out of the mentality that the learning has to come from a traditional classroom setting and you will be surprised how quickly you will learn.

• Find a language exchange partner: A key piece of language immersion is meeting and becoming friends with local people. Find someone who is your age, wants to learn English and who is from the host country. Meet with them once per week for a language exchange. How does it work? Get a coffee, sit down and divide the time that you both have available.  Speak in English for half the time and speak in your target language (their native language) for the second half.  Ask them to correct you but focus on building conversational skills. What are the benefits of this? There are many! You get real conversation practice, a chance to work on the grammar points that you learn during your classes and an opportunity to learn about the local culture and customs. You will make a local friend, hopefully get to meet that person’s group of friends and speak more of the target language!

• Go the right places: When you study a second language in a foreign country, your success comes down to hundreds of tiny choices that you make every day. You will have a choice between spending the evening out with your English speaking friends or joining your language exchange partner and his or her friends for a night out at a local restaurant or club. Will you stay in a hostel with other backpackers and speak English or will you live with locals and speak the language with them over dinners late into the evening? Will you go to the café that caters to travelers with a menu in English or will you walk into the café in Madrid that is full of Madrilenos? Of course, there will be times when you are feeling homesick and craving your home culture. That’s fine.  Go find your home culture in those situations. But make sure you are challenging yourself every day and stretching your limits. One way to do that is by going to the right places.

Language immersion is not meant to be comfortable in the sense that a Caribbean cruise is comfortable. However, if you are the kind of person who grows with challenge and if you are willing to take risks and put yourself into situations that a lot of people might shy away from then you will see the benefits of your efforts. You will return to your home country with a new language in your repertoire, knowledge and understanding of a new culture, a heap of valuable career skills and a memory that you will hold dear forever.

Is language immersion for you?
Lindsay McMahon is the Founder of English and Culture. Her company offers English tutoring and cultural competence training for international professionals in Boston and New York. She has lived, worked and traveled in Asia, Latin America and Europe and is a firm believer in the value of language learning through immersion.

If an entrepreneur is defined as an individual that manages an organization with considerable initiative and risk, then why can’t we call the New York Knicks playmaker, Jeremy Lin, an entrepreneur?

Super Lintendo’s rise to prominence isn’t so different to that of a successful startup. How many entrepreneurs can you name that could have made a very healthy (if that’s the right word) career for themselves on Wall Street or in finance, but turned their backs on such a path, to pursue their dreams? Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerburg, Steve Jobs, Jeremy Lin to name but a few…

Hang on, did I just throw Jeremy Lin in the same sentence as legends of entrepreneurship such as Bill Gates? Yes, and here’s why. Lin graduated from Harvard with a degree in economics – a perfect launching pad to a solid six figure opening salary job in New York, but said “no” to convention. Well, he did end up in the City; but as the Knicks’ point guard.

His story is the perfect metaphor for starting up a business. Just as everybody said that he was not cut out for professional hoops (he wasn’t offered an athletic scholarship and went undrafted into the NBA), all too often everybody will declare that your project is destined for instant failure. Overcoming this fear of failure is a key part of being an entrepreneur – indeed failure is even a “good learning experience” says LinkedIn’s Reid Hoffman (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-12151752)

It’s widely publicized that startups very rarely are profitable in their first year of operation – Lin was no different. On the back of a measly 2.6 points per game and 38.9% shooting in his rookie year, Lin was waived by the Warriors then the Rockets – and dropped down to the D-League on 3 occasions.

All startups experience their fair share of struggle, how you respond to opportunity is what will determine future success. I don’t need to tell you how this Linderella story played out as soon as Jeremy was picked up by the Knicks…

But just as Linsanity will inevitably wane once the Knicks start dropping a few more games or the public becomes bored of hearing about everybody’s favorite Asian American, so will any buzz you manage to drum up around your product/idea.

The key is to do it like Lin, and pick the right partners who can take you to the next level. Lin, a Nike sponsored athlete, has just launched a new range of footwear bearing his name and will front a Nike promotional tour to China. He must now consider whether to commit his long-term to them or one of his many other suitors though. You will have similar important decisions to make. The perception is that Nike are the only party to profit off of Linsanity, but play it right (as David Beckham did it right with Adidas for example) and Jeremy stands to reap the benefits of a powerful partnership offering him the chance to become a global brand. As a point of comparison, right now he’s making the league minimum for a sophomore player.

Nobody ever said being an entrepreneur would be easy (just ask New York’s point guard), but do it well and you’d be hard pressed to find a more satisfying way to lead your life.

 

 
We’ve often seen people we would consider crazy while travelling around the world, but there’s one thing I learned about perception and how to force everyone to view what you’re doing as something cool rather than lame: Have everyone around you do whatever you’re doing, together!
 
Here’s a video of the perfect way to do it.
There’s Case A: Dancing by yourself
And there’s Case B: Which you’ll see in a second.
Check it out!
 

Where the Hell is Matt?

Where the Hell is Matt? (2008) from Matthew Harding on Vimeo.

 
Though, HOW you’re going to convince everyone to dance with you is really a separate question.

Filmmaker – Juan Rayos

This first video features a group of girls boarding down a mountain near Madrid.
Una tarde patinando en la sierra de Madrid
A spring afternoon in the Madrid Mountains.

Carving the Mountains from Juan Rayos on Vimeo.

These next three videos are by the same filmmaker, now in the city!

Longboard Girls Crew from Juan Rayos on Vimeo.

MADRID LONGBOARD from Juan Rayos on Vimeo.

Surfing through Madrid during winter’s night.

Winter Night Longboard from Juan Rayos on Vimeo.

Here is a list :

Surfing

• Tamarindo, Costa Rica
• Jaco, Costa Rica
• Montanita, Ecuador
• Pichilemu, Chile
• Biarritz, France
• Salvador, Brazil
• Lisbon, Portugal

Salsa

• Most Latin America and Spain Locations

Samba

• All Brazil Locations

Yoga

• Tamarindo, Costa Rica
• Jaco, Costa Rica
• Montanita, Ecuador

Kitesurfing

• Playa Del Carmen, Mexico

Flamenco

• Tamarindo, Costa Rica
• Jaco, Costa Rica
• Montanita, Ecuador

Scuba Diving

• Playa Del Carmen, Mexico
• Tenerife, Spain

Tango

• All Argentina Locations

Kung Fu

• Beijing, China

Cooking and Wine Tasting

• Most Latin America and Europe Locations

Skiing

• Munich, Germany
• Mendoza, Argentina
• Santiago, Chile

Sailing

• Montevideo, Uruguay

Imagine taking almost a Terabyte of videos while traveling abroad, and compiling them into three VERY short videos. That’s exactly what these guys did while traveling all around the world. These three videos show how passionate people are about traveling and documenting their journey in a unique and creative way.

Each video plays with a few of the main facets of traveling, which are:

MOVE

MOVE from Rick Mereki on Vimeo.

LEARN

LEARN from Rick Mereki on Vimeo.

EAT

EAT from Rick Mereki on Vimeo.

Hope you enjoyed these videos as much as we did!
Go to Rick Mereki’s Channel on Vimeo

If you find anything interesting related to traveling/languages please don’t be afraid to shoot us a message at: info@Languatica.com

Madrid Festivals

There are festive activities to enjoy all throughout the year in or near Madrid! Here is a rundown of some of the events that you will be able to enjoy during your time there. A note of caution though, dates may change from year to year, so do be careful to double-check the local press when you are there for the exact dates.

February cont.

Also in February is a women’s festival – Santa Agueda. This happens on the first Sunday of the month in nearby Segovia.

On February 2nd and 3rd, there are two festivals. One is La Candaleria, which happens all throughout the country, but it is particularly popular in Madrid. This festival is a celebration of the event of Mary and Joseph taking Jesus to the temple 40 days after he was born. The second festival happening on those two days is La Endiablada, where everyone dresses up as devils. La Endiablada happens near Cuenca, in Almonacid.

On the week before Lent is Carnival. During this time, there are many many costume parties and parades (the most famous one happens in Cadiz). The Burial of the Sardine happens on Ash Wednesday, which marks the end of the Carnival.

About.com has a post on some of the dates for these festivals here

We have great news! We have recently partnered up with Tripping.com to offer you a cool place to interact and share your travel experiences and also your language journey too.

You can also take advantage of the Tripping.com contest which starts on September 1st and winners will be chosen on October 1st.

We are a proud sponsors of the contest, offering a two week language immersion program in Tamarindo,Costa Rica (a $595 Value). Be on the lookout for further details, as they will be coming up soon. In the meantime, go ahead and join our network, we will be broadcasting the announcement there as well.