Become fluent in Icelandic

I can get along rather well in my daily life, incl. job, now in Icelandic. Today I went to a place asking if they had any vacant positions, and I managed to keep the entire 10 minutes conversation in Icelandic, except for one word I didn’t know. So I’ve definitely advanced to being an intermediate learner. However, I’m still making quite a few mistakes, and honestly I doubt that I’ll ever be able to get that horrible challenging grammar to a level that would allow me to call myself fluent. Anyway, it’s not really a priority at the moment.

Soon after my last entry I found a job that didn’t require me to speak Icelandic… At the same time I thought I should get informed about the Finnish language, since I’d planned to move to Finland. This resulted in me becoming obsessed with Finnish and neglecting Icelandic again. Now, however, my bosses suggest that I might get a better job if I get decent in Icelandic soon. Apart from that it would be stupid to not use this opportunity – I could become fluent in an odd, notoriously difficult and pretty cool language, so I should go for it.

I finished half of the University of Iceland’s online course today. Learned more than 100 words with my vocabulary training program both today and yesterday. Next week I’ll make my own list of phrases for everyday life and for applying for a job, and finally start talking.

Just finished the “Before you know it lite” Icelandic. Except for At the restaurant 2 – I just get sick reading things like “rotten shark” and “sheep head jelly”... If I should ever be forced to be at a Þórrablót I know that I won’t have any of that stuff, without being sure about the details.

I mean, it’s embarrassing. I’m living in Iceland, I’ve been with my Icelandic boyfriend for more than a year, and still I don’t manage more than a very basic conversation. I’d even consider myself quite gifted in languages. I don’t know really why I haven’t made considerable progress for such a long time. I guess I’m a) deterred by all the grammar, b) afraid of not being able to speak it as well as I think I should, and c) I have quite a hard time understanding spoken language in general, and I still have a very hard time understanding anything in Icelandic. Well, d) it’s much more convenient for me to speak English, and it’s no problem for Icelanders.
Anyway, I’m going to continue with the University of Iceland’s great online course now: http://icelandic.hi.is/ – finally finished the first unit today.