MOUNTAIN LIFE - Coast Mountains | Fall Winter 2019

30 but I still hover my phone over menus to read the live translations appearing on screen. For personal interactions from afar, messaging apps can copy/paste/ translate in real time, meaning technology has almost replaced the need to learn a language at all. Except, of course, for face-to-face public interaction (aka: most of your life when you are in a new country). “Speak to each other!” says Kate Turner, head instructor and manager of International House Whistler, a private English language school. She has always encouraged talk over tech. “In my opinion and experience nothing beats face-to-face interaction. We are all here to learn how to speak, so let’s do it.” That personal, localized connection of learning small talk, swear words and slang can’t be replaced by technology. And according to Turner there are few better places for language learning than on a chairlift. “You are stuck on this lift with someone for five minutes or so, and as long you keep your phone in your pocket you are kind of forced to talk,” she says. “My students are always amazed that people want to talk to them on the lifts. They come into class super excited after a chairlift chat.” Technology can create a bridge over the language barrier, but it can’t totally break it down (yet). Only real, human interactions can do that. Memorizing vocab, sentence and grammar on a phone is cool, but practicing with a local enriches the experience and helps the lesson stick. Language connects us. And while real-time translation earbuds are already on the market, technology still hasn’t found a way to replace eye contact or the warmth and humour of fumbling through haphazard verbal communication. Getting lost in a new language, that’s the richest way to learn—where mistakes and mispronunciations lead to laughter, or in my case, love: two universal languages. There are few better places for language learning than on a chairlift. In wine is truth, but in beer is no fear. Bars are good for learning useful vocab. CARMEN KUNTZ Instagram launched on October 6, 2010 and quickly became the number one photography app, gathering 100,000 users in one week and 1 million in two months. It now has more than 600 million users.