The International Association
of Hyperpolyglots
HYPIA
est. 2016
Interview with
Laura Homs
Name: Laura Homs
Nationality or Ethnicity: Spanish (from Catalonia)
Where do you live?: Switzerland
Languages: Catalan (native), Spanish (native), German (C1), English (C1), French (B2), Italian (B1), Russian (B1), Swedish (A2).
Member since:
2021-01-02
1. What’s your story? How did you get into all these languages?
I was always passionate about languages and so I studied linguistics and translation. During my studies, I focused on English and French, but was also learning German on my free time.
I have now been living in Germany for 8 years and I cannot imagine moving back to Barcelona, I somehow found my home abroad. While in Germany, I have met a lot of Russian people and so I started to learn Russian in 2014.
During the pandemic, everything was very chaotic and I was feeling I had no control over what was going on around me, so I decided to start a language YouTube channel and also started learning Italian, as I love the country and it was a language I had always loved the sound of.
In 2021, I would like to focus on Italian and Russian. My goal would be to have at least a B2 level in all the languages I speak. If I am able to achieve this, I would like to learn a new language in 2022, maybe a completely different one, such as Japanese.
2. Which language(s) do you wish you could spend more time practising?
In 2021 I was focusing more on Russian and Italian, and I won't stop practising them, but now I'm in love with Swedish. It's definitely blowing my mind.
3. What are some languages you’d like to learn in the future?
Maybe Japanese, Portuguese and Swedish. It would be cool to be conversational in 10 languages someday, but I am patient and do not want to rush it. I have the feeling if I try to do too much at once, it will start being stressful and I want it to be fun.
4. So let’s be honest, what’s the sexiest language?
Oh man, that one is hard… Can I choose both French and Italian?
5. What’s the greatest pleasure you get from speaking so many languages?
I basically get an adrenaline shot, so I feel good and it makes me happy. I also love watching movies, comedy shows, listening to music… in different languages. I just feel like if you speak more languages, you have access to a lot more content. It just broadens your horizon in a way that fascinates me.
6. Some people say the world is really just going to have a few languages left in a 100 years, do you think this is really true?
That would be a pity, but I guess it is up to all of us, whether this happens or not.
If I am completely honest though, I myself prefer to learn languages with more speakers… I just think that there will be more material, more media, more people to speak to. That being said, I really admire people who choose to learn “smaller languages” or endangered ones. We need them!
7. What is your message to young (and not so young) people out there who are interested in studying multiple languages?
Go for it and enjoy the process. Don’t try to be perfect in a language and don’t get frustrated when making mistakes, it is just part of the process.