Why do you learn a foreign language?

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It's fun learning about other cultures, food, traveling, meeting new people and comparing cultural differences.

I also like languages for the academic interest. I find comparative linguistics and grammar fascinating and it can even be therapeutic to those with mental health issues. If you're learning a language, that's time not spent worrying or having panic attacks!

Lastly, there's the hope that it will one day help with a career, jobs or employment. I learn a different language when my life takes a different path:

-I learnt Indonesian when my family and I vacationed there all the time.

-I learnt Chinese when the Beijing Olympics was on.

-I learnt German because my family owns a company that deals with a lot of Germans.

-I'm learning Spanish because I moved to the United States and I didn't come from a country with a big Hispanic or Latin-American heritage. I knew nada.

Now, I'm honing in on my local state and the most-spoken languages are Spanish, German, Dutch, Chinese, Somali and Arabic.