Jeh and Yet

We have been in phonetics and language acquisition training for two weeks. We have learned zero Portuguese instead picking up Russian and a little Jeh, a Vietnamese tribal language. We learned it not to use it; none of the people in our class are going to Vietnam. We learned it to prove a point. By doing intentional projects and practicing pronunciation we were surprised how much Russian we were able to learn in a rather short amount of time. We are now going to take these projects and massive amount of advise to Brazil.
Our teachers are Dwight and Barbara Gradin, both of whom taught Roger and Gwen Stuber before they went to Irian Jaya over 20 years ago. And later Dwight traveled to Indonesia and blew everyone away by learning the language in one month. So they are good, very good. Dwight and Barbara have been around, and they know a thing or two about language acquisition. Through their tutilage, learning a second language has become both exponentionally more complicated as well as more attainable, if that makes sense. Language learning, the Gradin's shared, has made grown, manly men cry, and is the number one reason for missionary attrition. And yet they have given us so many tools that we are actually looking forward to getting started. Most days one of the Gradins read a letter from a missionary that has gone through this program and reports back on their experience on the field. One such letter shared about a sound in Uzbek that he just could not master. Instead of giving up, the missionary explained that he "hasn't figured out the pronunciation... yet." One of Dwight's mantras is that he never wants to hear "I can't say that sound", "I can't hear the difference in that pronunciation", "I just can't get this language", without adding this one final word: yet. As difficult as learning Portuguese is I hope I remember why I'm learning the language, I hope I don't give up, and I hope if I ever can't figure out a word I'll remember that other little word: "yet". ~bzp & jtp