What milestones have you hit on your target language?

[sporedandroid]

Even though I’m a beginner in Hebrew it’s fun to look at milestones I’ve hit. One interesting milestone I’ve hit is that I now understand Hebrew better than Yiddish. When I first watched Shtisel I felt I understood the Yiddish scenes better than the Hebrew scenes. When I watched it again after ramping up my studying I understood the Hebrew better. It took me a while to get to this point because I was taking studying slow.
It took me a long time to feel like I had a feel for Hebrew. I think I started to get a feel for it when I started studying sentence cards on anki. Maybe I should have started them from the beginning. I did start out on duolingo and they used sentences, but Hebrew words didn’t even seem like real words at first. That weird feeling never happened with any other language I studied.

[cjareck]

Since my language learning is for specific goal mainly - to be able to read historical sources, the milestones are also connected with that. I remember struggling with German books. I was able to determine that someone shoots or attacks, but it was hard to figure out which side of conflict does that
In French and Russian, the crucial milestone was the ability to figure out which fragments have to be translated because they are the most important for me. Unfortunately, I didn't go much beyond that. At least until now.
In Hebrew, I remember watching the pages of the book and seeing nothing. The only word I could read and understand was מיג-15 (MiG-15) because of its simplicity. Now I am more or less at the same level as French and Russian, but I am not going to stop until I am reading smoothly.
With Arabic, there is nothing much. However, I remember showing my students a film about improvised armoured cars in the Syrian Civil War, and suddenly I read an Arabic inscription on one of them. It was, of course, "Allahu akbar". The second small step is that I can easily read "eastern Arabic numerals" which are painted on the aircraft for example.

[sporedandroid]

One milestone I’m noticing in Hebrew is recognizing a lot more words in my study sentences. Knowing all the words in a sentence doesn’t guarantee I’ll understand it, but it sure helps me go through the sentences faster. When my vocabulary was smaller it was so hard on my brain to do sentence cards. Now I notice how much faster I learn vocabulary with sentence cards.

[jonathanrace]

One thing I've noticed is when certain parts of the language go from conscious effort to automatic. A bit like walking, you don't think about it but it just happens. It's only in certain bits atm but where it is taking place, I am very grateful.

[Elsa Maria]

While living abroad, I was thrilled when I was finally able to make a phone call and understand the recording (press one to make an appointment, press two for billing, etc). No more randomly pushing buttons! No more walking to the doctor’s office just to make an appointment!

[Speakeasy]

When I moved to Québec some thirty-plus years ago, learning French was curiously similar to the beginning of a new personal relationship, everything about the language fascinated me. I can still recall walking down the street during the first few weeks, filled the excitement of having embarked on a great adventure and trying to decode the street signs, the commercial signs, the advertising in the shop windows, the labels on physical goods, and so forth. As the months -- and then the years – passed, I went through the (now) predictable phases of stagnation, regression, a sense of hopelessness, renewed advancement, self-assurance and, ultimately, the acknowledgement that I had finally mastered the language. Somewhere along the way (I can no longer recall when, in the tenth year, perhaps later?) it struck me that my “sense of wonder” about the language had evaporated, French had simply become part of my daily life -- a tool for communication, one to be manipulated according to the circumstances -- but nothing more. I would imagine that many immigrants experience a similar sensation. When I had this strange revelation, I experienced the feeling of having lost something of considerable value. A milestone, yes, but one accompanied by a tinge of sadness.

[Juan learns]

In my endlessly endeavor to master the Romanian language I have recently hit the milestone of thinking in Romanian

[Lianne]

A couple of months ago I discovered that I could read French! I can't read everything, and I don't always know the meaning of every single word, but I know enough to be able to read a YA novel or a local news article. This was really exciting, and felt like a bigger jump in progress than I'd ever experienced before. And now that I can sit and read a book, I feel like I'm getting better all the time!

[DaveAgain]

I understood the few words of german used in an english language TV drama tonight!

I'm still looking up almost every word when I read, but I occasionally get runs of two or three lines where I don't have to.

[IronMike]

My most important milestone came about 5-6 months into my Basic Russian Course at DLI many moons ago. I woke one morning remembering my dream (rare for me) and being amazed that my mom spoke to me in Russian in my dream! The other milestone came years later, unsure exactly when, when I finally realized I don't have to know 100% of a Russian conversation. What I mean is, prior to that, my brain would latch onto an unknown word or small phrase within a spoken passage (whether IRL or through audio I was listening to) and I'd get distracted, missing a lot of what came later in the passage. I finally realized it is okay to make logical guesses at what the person is telling me, based on the (hopefully) 50+% of the passage that I do understand. If I respond illogically, my interlocutor will restate what s/he said. Around 2010 I also came to realize it is okay if I mess up a case ending, or use the incorrect motion verb, as long as the person I'm talking to understands me! I came to this conclusion after I experienced a woman speaking to Russian officers in the worst Russian I'd ever heard, grammar-wise. Her endings were all over the place. Her motion verbs...oy. But the Russians understood her perfectly and she understood them well. I spent about 5 days with her and the Russians three times a year for two years. Her grammar never got any better, but that didn't matter. She was a 3/3 on the DLPT and I was not.

For BCS, the milestone came about two months into Turbo-Serbo when I would be imagining conversations (preparing for my OPI) and my brain would imagine these conversations in BCS rather than Russian, which I had been "working" for over 10 years when I attended the course.

For Esperanto it came ~2003 when I had my first-ever conversation (telephone group chat) in the language after being an eterna komencanto for 10 years or so. I was amazed I could translate my receptive Esperanto proficiency into productive skills.