>Me, too, but they're not the norm.

You are wrong, and I can prove it.

But perhaps we are speaking at cross purposes.

If you are saying it is more difficult to learn a second language as an adult then of course I agree. It is profoundly difficult. But Jackie's "nearly impossible" is quite incorrect.

I live in South Korea and several of my adult friends have learnt the language as I am learning it. Sure, it takes about ten to fifteen years of study and immersion, but it can be done. They speak it very well.

Most are university graduates teaching English, but a good number of the American troops stationed along the DMZ have married Korean nationals and learnt the language as adults, and many of them are "unschooled". I have seen some interviewed on television, and they speak the language very well.

These are ordinary people of average intelligence who have learnt as adults to speak a language that is notoriously difficult to learn, and to speak it well.

Interestingly, those who do speak it well that I have talked to were all conversant with various mnemonic techniques. And I have read of memory demonstrations in which mnemonists have learnt to converse in a language after incredibly little study by the application of powerful memory systems. I have not met a single soul who has succeeded in learning the language by rote. That may be nearly impossible for an adult.

Ultimately, I think this is a difference of cultural perspective. North Americans, like us New Zealanders, are inveterately monolingual, hence the misconception.