#im not bilingual myself but i took uhh a foreign language class and understand some snippets of another language

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russell adler headcanon about hearing you speak a different language (not russian, english, nor german? prefer if you didn't specify what language specifically so everyone who is bilingual/multilingual can relate to this headcanon!)

does anyone else go “y’know, the... the thing” when the word just doesn’t come to mind? 

When Adler first hears you speak it, he had to do a double take

If he doesn't recognize it, he'll ask you what language

"When'd you learn that?"

He finds it intriguing to say the least, noting your difficulty to find the right words when trying to mentally translate

Though, Adler is multilingual himself so he understands to an extent, being patient about it

if he has time, he’ll learn a couple phrases, and then butcher it horribly when reciting it back to you: “Did I say that right?”

“Y-yeah? Your pronunciation is great.” (lies, you’re trying not to laugh, he sees it), but you’re impressed at his interest

On the whim that Adler becomes more invested, he buys a book about it

codeswitching: there’s those moments where you use filler words in place for another, and damn it’s a struggle trying to figure out what you actually mean

either that or you just switch languages while in the middle of a sentence and you just leave him stunned

gotta play those mental gymnastic games where you’re trying to find the proper word in the appropriate language, Adler just listing off whatever word comes to mind when hearing you describe it

some phrases can’t be directly translated unfortunately without losing effect of it’s original meaning, so he could only hope there isn’t some context missing 

he catches you uttering under your breath sometimes and he makes mental notes to ask what they mean later on, or to use it himself and then find out what they mean the hard way

once Adler gets a good understanding of your thinking, you can catch him finishing your sentences when your struggling, and everyone else looks at the both of you in confusion (how the fuck did he know what you were talking about)

if you’re his s/o, he’ll try his damn best to say i love you in the language (although he rarely says i love you in general straight out, so it takes some time), he stresses a bit trying to get pronunciation right before going up to you 

he finds it really amusing as you get flustered

#anyways this reminded me of the linguistics class i took it was interesting #had to bring out the textbook for this one #a nice refresher #russell adler #hc #asks #ghxstduty #text #abcd briefing #for the last one #adler probably said something entirely different depending on the difficulty of the language #call of duty imagines #cod #call of duty #bo:cw #black ops cold war #call of duty black ops cold war #im not bilingual myself but i took uhh a foreign language class and understand some snippets of another language #not going to identify which two languages for fun