Dipping a toe in a new language

I've known for almost a year that I might be going to Morocco, but only for sure since early December.  That's a long time to be anxiously wondering, and a long time spent looking for ways to prepare myself that wouldn't turn out to be a complete waste of time if my assignment turned out to be somewhere else.  The three primary languages spoken in Morocco are Moroccan Arabic (aka Darija), Berber (of which there are numerous variants, but trying to keep this simple), and French.  The first two are pretty difficult if not impossible to learn Stateside, esp. with the limited educational resources available to me in SC, so I decided to go with French--knowing full well that it will probably be the language I'll rely on the least over there, but it's also the most portable to other likely assignment locations.  And besides, I've always wanted to learn French.  I've probably seen hundreds if not thousands of French-language films in my day, so it's long overdue.

Originally I planned on taking a 101 course at the local state university, but my trip to India right in the middle of the fall semester made that impractical.  I've always been skeptical of the legion of teach-yourself language products out there, despite the fact that anyone who knows me knows I think "self-taught" is the best kind of knowledge there is.  If those things were effective in proportion to how many millions of them exist, then we'd be a far less monolinguistic nation.  Same principle applies to diet books and other diet products; we probably have more of those than any other country in the world, and still manage to be among the fattest. (The top two can almost certainly blame genetics.)  Actually, that's a good analogy.  Lots of people start learning new languages like they start a diet--throw themselves into it with a lot of enthusiasm at first, buy some product to help them out, then quickly realize how hard it is and it falls by the wayside.  Learning a new language, like losing weight, is supposed to be a lot of hard work.  It requires patience, discipline, practice, and long-term commitment.  Anyone who tells you otherwise is trying to make a buck and probably doesn't care if you succeed or fail.

After a lot of research, I decided to go with the relatively new company called Fluenz, despite their ridiculous name that sounds like something you need to get vaccinated for.  Theirs is a series of lectures and workouts presented on DVD-ROM, supplemented with some audio CD content.  At present, they only produce in a few languages, but fortunately French is one of them.  They present themselves as sort of the anti-Rosetta Stone, and even though I've only barely seen what RS is actually like, that sounded like the way I wanted to go.  They craft their lessons not in a futile attempt at duplicating the total immersion experience, but talk to you like an adult who can understand sophisticated instruction.  Each hour-longish lesson begins with a conversation that we hear and read, followed by a 5-10 minute lecture explaining what we've just heard and exploring the concepts and vocabulary, followed by a series of workouts (both written and spoken) that are similar to the old-fashioned workbook exercises we did for homework in high school.  The best part is the instructor, Sonia, who guys will especially enjoy and who apparently teaches all their languages, even Mandarin!

The software itself was incredibly buggy; it had all kinds of obvious mistakes, poorly re-dubbed audio during the lectures, random gaps and inconsistencies, and the microphone workouts didn't work at all on any computer I tried them on.  (They have since released a version 2.0 for all languages that probably fixes a lot of this.) Yet despite all that, it's been the most rewarding language learning I've done, because it it actually kept me wanting to come back for more.  I find myself thinking, or trying to think, in very basic French and speaking aloud whenever I can, often to the annoyance of those around me.  In fact, I'm sorry to see it end after completing all 60 lessons of Levels I and II.  There's supposed to be a Level III coming, but it won't be out in time for me, so I'm kind of at a loss now for how to keep building on what I've learned and not let it atrophy (which is the other big risk with learning a new language you aren't forced to speak every day, as I will be in the Peace Corps), but I suppose I have bigger fish to fry in the near future.