I USED to joke that I spoke French like a 3-year-old. Until I met a French 3-year-old and couldn’t hold up my end of the conversation. This was after a year of intense study, including at least two hours a day with Rosetta Stone, Fluenz and other self-instruction software, Meetup groups, an intensive weekend class and a steady diet of French movies, television and radio, followed by what I’d hoped would be the coup de grâce: two weeks of immersion at one of the top language schools in France.

我曾经开玩笑说，我讲的法语像是三岁小孩。直到有一天我遇到了一个三岁的法国小孩，可是在对话时我却接不上茬。在那以前，我已经经历了一年的密集学习，包括每天花两小时用Rosetta Stone、Fluenz等自学软件学习，参加Meetup的互助小组，周末参加强化班，长期观看和收听法语的电影、电视、广播。之后我又在法国最好的语言学校里泡了两个星期，我本以为这会是“制胜一击”(coup de grâce)。

“French resistance” took on an entirely new meaning as my brain repelled every strategy I employed. Yet my failure was in fact quite unremarkable. Advertising claims notwithstanding, few adults who tackle a foreign language achieve anything resembling proficiency. In the end, though, it turns out that spending a year not learning French may have been the best thing I could’ve done for my 57-year-old brain.

我的大脑排斥了我运用过的所有策略，于是“法兰西抵抗”对我有了全新的意义。而实际上我的挫折相当平常，尽管有各种各样的广告宣传，但极少有成年人能参透一门外语，达到接近娴熟的程度。到头来，我虽然花了一年时间也没学会法语，那却可能是我对已经57岁的大脑所做的最好的事。

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