Babie Barung

I have to admit I belong to the type of students who need very structured coursework, guided by a teacher inside a classroom. I cannot just learn a language by going out to talk to the locals on the streets, or by listening to a few songs, or watching a movie. I need a book and I need to read the text. If this sounds familiar to you, then it is worth continuing to read this and maybe it's time for you to change your mind about yourself. I forgot to mention in my last few posts that before landing my first gig in Portugal, I did spend some time on the Pimsleur program aside from playing with the Duolingo App. I was very skeptical about learning a language just by listening, but after a few short sessions, I realized the Pimsleur method works quite well for me. They now have the European Portuguese available but back then it was just Brazilian Portuguese and they used the São Paulo accent.  After a few sessions, I have improved a lot, and although the program encourages you to list...

This is a brief summary of the resources I have shared in my earlier notes . So if you're time-poor like me and don't want to read my long boring notes, here's a quick overview of everything you need to begin your journey to learn (European) Portuguese. Online Resources: Drops APP You'll be able to improve and build up your vocabulary very quickly. I find the free version is good enough for me, but you may opt for the premium version if you want to use it more intensively. I find a daily 5-minute usage is just right. Practice Portuguese For €15 a month, this is not a course but a collection of audio clips and passages which you can use to improve your listening skills. DeepL This is a very good alternative to Google Translate as it offers translation in European Portuguese. Courses: Instituto Camões A public institute run by the Government to promote the learning of Portuguese, it offers both online and on-campus courses , from Levels A1 to C2 . Their online courses ar...

I am going to give you a few examples of those who moved to Portugal at around the same time as I did (2015) and they are now (2022) speaking Portuguese very fluently. Colleague #1 : He is smart enough to learn it on a street and even married a Portuguese. Colleague #2 : A single mom with three kids, she first landed a gig here in Portugal in 2015 without base pay. Starting in a new country is already tough, not to mention her very challenging circumstances. She lives in Cascais, and enrolled herself into this immersive short course at the ICLP which is part of the Faculdade de Letras (Universidade de Lisboa). She insisted her colleagues to speak Portuguese with her only, and shortly afterwards she was able to communicate swiftly with everyone. Not only so, but she's also doing a lot of business with Portuguese people! Impressive! Since then, she has also picked up Italian and now learning Dutch. Her native tongue is Latvian & Russian, she learned German in school and speaks p...

To say I've zero knowledge of the Portuguese language is no longer that true. At least I can order my food without problems. I often joke with my Portuguese friends that " Quando estou com fome, falo português fluentemente. Mas normalmente, não conheço nada. " (When I'm hungry, I speak fluent Portuguese but normally I don't understand anything) Back in 2015, there were not many learning resources in European Portuguese. Most available courses were in Brazilian Portuguese. One might argue it's still Portuguese, just like American vs British English. So what's the big deal, right? I'm not interested to debate which option is better, but if you have 0 knowledge of Portuguese and planning to be in Portugal, the choice is obvious. Go for the EU version. The accent is completely different.  Without many available options, I practiced my Portuguese using the Duolingo APP which offered Brazilian Portuguese only. During my first days here, I realized the one c...

I guess one thing that makes us all reluctant to move to Portugal is the language. Although most locals you meet would assure you that " It's fine. Portuguese speak very good English ", this statement doesn't hold so true if you're living here long term. You still need to know a few words to get by. Some restaurant menus are only in Portuguese. The vendor at the train ticket office only speaks Portuguese. So are the people in the markets & shops, your hairdressers & handymen, and not the least, when you need to deal with bureaucracy: tax authorties, immigration officers etc. That's when your real nightmare begins. You really don't need Portuguese to live here? Oh boy, please don't be disillusioned to believe in such a myth.  Being a resident in Portugal is completely different from being a tourist in Portugal . I've been living in Portugal since 2015. In my first few years, I worked at a Portuguese company and my colleagues are Portuguese ...